Previous official predictions have indicated that Finland could somehow avoid the worst fallout from the global financial and economic crisis.
Earlier this autumn, the central bank said it expected the economy to grow by 1.3 percent next year and the year after.
Now the talk is openly of certain economic contraction, including projections for increased job losses.
The Bank of Finland has revised its economic forecasts, and now expects that growth in Finland next year will stall at negative 0.5 percentage point. At the same time, the central bankers aren't even standing by those conservative estimates - meaning that actual economic performance could fall short of that prediction. However, it is still not clear whether this economic slide will be as bad as the recession of the 1990s.
There does seem to be a glimmer of hope that the downward trend will not last - growth for the subsequent year, 2010, has been provisionally posted at a positive 0.7 percent.
The Ministry of Finance is pinning its hopes on economic stimulus by way of tax relief and salary increases to kick-start spending and economic activity.
However the central bankers fear that in these uncertain times, consumers will tend to save any extra euros they get, rather than spend them.
