Lastest News from the Findian World in Finland and India.
13th September 2021, Oulu, Finland
First snowfall in Oulu
Oulu saw the first light snowfall today, the 13th of September. The air temperature was between 2 and 3 degrees Celsius. The snow melted before it hit the ground. It is the earliest recorded snowfall in autumn
during the last 37 years.
13th September 2021, Helsinki, Finland
Finnish Customs detected prohibited ethylene oxide in several foodstuffs
From the end of last year, the foodstuff controls by Customs detected ethylene oxide in several foodstuffs. The detection of the substance, which is harmful to health, increased in the EU area in 2020 after which Finnish Customs also began monitoring the concentrations in imported foodstuffs. During monitoring, ethylene oxide was found in five lots of seeds and nut products. In future, the monitoring will be even more efficient, when the Customs Laboratory’s own examination method is completed.
Of foodstuff samples monitored by Customs at the end of 2020 and beginning of 2021, five contained ethylene oxide, which is a biocide that is harmful to health and prohibited in the EU.
– Ethylene oxide was found in sesame seeds, nut products containing sesame seeds as well as in ecological psyllium powder. Even though the quantities found were not especially large in relation to the monitored product lots, the observations show the importance of monitoring, says Jonna Neffling, Head of Product Safety at Finnish Customs.
Ethylene oxide should not occur in foodstuffs at all, since it can cause serious health problems when they are used long-term. It is classified as a dangerous substance, which causes cancer as well as cell mutations and is toxic for reproduction. However, in some parts of the world, ethylene oxide is used as a biocide, for example when sterilizing seeds and spices. Using it for this purpose is prohibited in the EU.
Part of the foodstuffs examined by Customs that contained ethylene oxide came from the EU area; some from outside the EU. To date, Customs has examined 30 different product lots for ethylene oxide. The monitoring has been targeted based on observations by other Member States among others.
Increase in observations has caused concern in the EU since last year
In the autumn of 2020, several EU countries observed worryingly high concentrations of ethylene oxide in sesame seeds imported from India. Since then, the substance has been found in several other foodstuffs, such as spices and food supplements. With the increase in observations, even more attention has been paid to monitoring, and methods of analysis have been developed in many EU countries.
– At Customs, the monitoring of ethylene oxides in foodstuffs began at the end of the year 2020. We monitor both foodstuffs declared from outside the EU and foodstuffs that arrive in intra-EU trade. These foodstuffs are chosen for controls based on risk assessment. The monitoring is done within the framework of normal foodstuff controls, Neffling says.
In future, the monitoring of ethylene oxide will improve, when the Customs Laboratory’s own examination method under development is completed.
– The Customs Laboratory has examined ethylene oxide in the past, but when the need for monitoring decreased, the examinations were abandoned approximately twenty years ago. The recent findings show that there is again a need for monitoring. With our own method, we can enhance the monitoring further. This gives us better possibilities to facilitate food safety and prevent harmful substances ending up on the consumers’ plates, Pirjo Sainio the Director of the Customs Laboratory concludes.
Story is from the ©Helsinki Times
Source: Finnish Customs
14th September 2021, Bengaluru, India
Finnish PayIQ, India’s SRIT to launch APP
(ANI/BusinessWire India): Finnish mobile ticketing company PayiQ and Indian ICT systems integration company SRIT have signed a strategic partnership deal.
PayiQ Finland is a true European public transport and city access technology company. It delivers ticketing and payment platform for city bus and tram authorities across Europe and Russia. PayiQ's core technology solution provides seamless mobility and big data moderation, analysis, and collection across multimodal means of public and city's shared transport.
PayiQ's award-winning Ticketing as a Service (TaaStrade;) platform has been delivering pure passenger joy. It is hassle-free, easy to use and quick to adopt. It allows passengers to travel across urban networks while operators improve their efficiency and reduce their technology adoption burden and related operating expenses.
SRIT India's partnership with PayiQ is strategic, so much so that the deal envisages source code transfer. This collaboration is for multimodal transport - be it metro, bus, or any form of shared mobility. The goal is to enable First Mile Last Mile transportation.
India is an emerging landscape of various modes of transport that serve the cities and their suburbs. The tremendous expansion of growing cities and their connectivity points will soon lead to modernization of transport both on land and rail. As cities gear up to modernize their fleets and augment new routes and manage paperless tickets, the significant step to digitization will come from mobile ticketing and payments with multimodal journeys.
No one mode will suffice to meet the needs of riders and commuters, and this demand and growth will require faster ways to have a ticket and complete journeys. Both contactless and cashless systems are wide in variety in India at the moment. They will grow in the digitized economy when operators embark on their platforms and maximize their revenue and margin goals. Operators will use such opportunities to widen their product range to ensure that the various options provide reliable value to riders and at the same time safeguard the operator's margins.
PayiQ's ticketing platform TaaStrade;has, and will have, hardware-free validation process. Therefore, both contactless and touchless. It supports any ticketing scenario and regulatory requirements. PayiQ's cloud-based technology provides transportation companies, municipalities, and smart city organizations real-time data on passenger volumes, commuting patterns, dead zone patterns and possibility to communicate during journeys. It enables transportation operators to analyze trends, optimize their services and deliver targeted content to public transport users.
The platform can also deliver "future feature" services like push notifications and location-based advertising. This allows city operators and municipalities to make their best customer connection either during the ride, before the ride or after passengers have completed their journeys, and generate value added service revenues across city access agenda models.
The PayiQ platform also allows operators to smoothly transition to post-paid, account-based ticketing (ABT) and advanced BIBO validation for contactless and paperless systems, assuring larger revenue realization. PayiQ's solutions have been implemented in various European cities and integrated with leading banks and payment wallets. PayiQ ticketing platform TaaStrade;delivers "the world's most economical ticket on your phone".
The strategic partnership of PayiQ and SRIT will transform India's emerging digitization need to a realization that all technology adoptions are frugal and mindful of the society and its wider range of commuters. PayiQ and SRIT with their technology platforms will provide an ecosystem to the state and central authorities both for bus and rail transport to replicate and adopt modern mobile ticketing solutions with wide product range and payment methods.
It will enable a larger participation of transport solution providers to integrate and provide First Mile Last Mile or multimodal journey planning to its respective city users. Such technology can further realize "One Nation One App" goal for public transportation sector.
This story is provided by ©BusinessWire India. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of this article. (ANI/BusinessWire India)
Editors Comment: In 1996, the Editor took the Finnish product from bustard product from Oulu Buscom to India and had demonstration sessions in both Mumbai and Bengaluru. It was too early in time for India although the product with its RFID chip card was had been very successful in Oulu, Finland.
15th September 2021, Oulu, Finland:
The Indian Ambassador to Finland and Estonia, His Excellency Shri Raveesh Kumar, is visiting Oulu and hosting a dinner for the large Indian Community living, studying and working in the City.
His Excellency Mr. Shri Raveesh Kumar was appointed as the Ambassador of India to Finland in June 2020. He replaced Ambassador Vani Rao.
Before his appointment, Ambassador Kumar was the Spokesperson and The Joint Secretary of the External Publicity Division from July 2017 till April 2020.
Born in January 1971, Ambassador Kumar did his schooling at the Delhi Public School, New Delhi and obtained his Bachelor’s Degree with Honours in History from Hansraj College, Delhi University.
He is a fluent speaker of Bahasa Indonesia. He is married to Ranjana Raveesh, a management consultant, and they have two sons, Swastik Satyam and Satvik Shubham. He majored from a top college, Hansraj College, of Delhi University with History as his major subject.
He joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1995. He started his diplomatic career at the Indian Mission in Jakarta in 1997. He was the Political Counsellor responsible for bilateral political relationships and engagements with UK Parliament in London. He was Deputy Chief of Mission to Jakarta from September 2010 to August 2013. He was Consul General of India in Frankfurt from August 2013 to July 2017.
Editor: Welcome to Oulu Your Excellency.
14th September 2021, Finland Helsinki
The Indian Davis Cup team arrived a few days ago in Helsinki to take part in the first round of the Davbids Cup against Finland.
World Group I First Round
Date: 17-18 Sep 2021
Venue: Espoo Metro Areena
Location: Espoo, Finland
Surface: Hard Indoor
The Finnish team is captained by Jarkko Nieminen and the Indian team is captained by Rohit Rajpal.
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The Finnish team consists of Emil Ruusuvuori (who is ranked 66 in the world), Niklas saslminen, Henrti Kontinen (ranked 45th in the world in doubles), Otto Virtanern and Harri Herliovaara.
The Indian team is composed of Prajersh Gunneswaran, Saketh Myneni, Divij Sharan, Ramkumar Ramanathan and Rohan Bopanna (who is in the world ranked 48 in doubles).
