VATUPASSI - Responsible Future

Companies and business service organizations do not have sufficient methods and tools to systematically address corporate responsibility issues in their strategy work. This project will seek solutions to identify and understand responsibility as a cross-cutting theme in companies' strategy, product and service process development and the supply chain.

The project will develop, test and pilot responsibility ladders for companies of different sizes and at different stages of their development. During the pilot, a VATUPASSI-toolkit will be built for companies and business service organizations to get their responsibility issues in order. With a large project area and close cooperation with the project partners, new approaches to responsibility management will be developed jointly. From a project area that is diverse in terms of business sizes and sectors, the results will be scaled up, in terms of knowledge, business benefits and geographical coverage.

The project will focus specifically on companies' financial responsibility skills. Increased regulation has led to growing demands for accountability from financial institutions and investors. Investors and banks will require companies to understand, act and be transparent about responsibility issues as a condition for funding. More and more companies will be subject to reporting requirements. Although it will not directly affect micro and small enterprises, it will have an impact on the whole supply chain, for example. Large companies and public authorities as clients will require responsibility reporting as part of their own supply chain and responsibility reporting work.

The project will clarify the aspects of ESG reporting and the factors influencing the assessment from a company's perspective and provide guidelines and a basis to support ESG reporting. Micro and small enterprises in particular need support in responsibility and the need to identify and develop responsibility skills has emerged. While large companies have dedicated responsibility experts, in micro and small companies’ corporate responsibility is handled by the entrepreneur alongside other work.

The project will make responsibility reporting a strategic tool for companies to manage the growing reporting workload and create a positive image of the company towards customers and partners. Similarly, business service organizations need models and tools to respond to the growing demand for corporate reporting obligations and to help their various corporate clients at different stages of their business life cycle to take wider ownership of corporate responsibility issues.

First, the impact of the project's activities is visible at the level of the participating companies. The results of the project will also be transmitted immediately through the business service organizations in their normal activities as responsibility services to all enterprises in the project area of the co-project promoters, multiplying the impact. As a result of the project, companies' anticipation skills and capacity to respond to changes in the business environment will be significantly improved.

The project targets are micro, small and medium-sized enterprises, and business service organizations in the project's operating area in the southern part of Northern Ostrobothnia. The main implementer of the group project is Kerttu Saalasti Institute of the University of Oulu and part implementers are the City of Kalajoki, Nivala-Haapajärvi region NIHAK ry and the City of Ylivieska. The City of Kalajoki is also responsible for implementing measures in the Raahe region. The project is co-funded by the European Union and the funding has been granted by the Centre for Economic Development, Transport and the Environment of Northern Ostrobothnia. In addition to the implementers, the other funders of the project are the Raahe Region Development and the Kerttu Saalasti Foundation.

More information:
Jaana Jeminen, project manager
jaana.jeminen@oulu.fi
+358 505 916 216