that the single monetary policy could be inappropriate or even grossly inappropriate for the finnish economy. the following reasons were put forward for the asymmetry of the finnish economy vis - a - vis the other euro countries : the structure of our production and foreign trade was one - sided. the share of the forest industry in production and exports, although declining, was much larger in finland than in other european countries. in the 1990s our industry became very technology - intensive, largely as a result of the growth of the mobile phone and network industry. this made the finnish industry vulnerable to negative developments in the telecom sector. only a third of our exports went to the euro area, so finland was also more vulnerable to disturbances from outside the euro area than the others. there was a particular concern about exchange rate movements : it was feared that the movements of the swedish krona, the pound sterling and the us dollar vis - a - vis the euro would undermine the competitiveness of the finnish economy. a specific asymmetric feature in the finnish economy was the bilateral trade with the soviet union. it enabled finland to pay its higher oil bill by increasing exports to the soviet union. even after the collapse of the soviet union, trade between finland and russia has correlated positively with the price of oil. deregulation after mid - 1980s resulted in a large credit boom and in a rapid increase in asset prices, investment and consumption. the interest costs were deductible in taxation. this together with inflation contributed to low real interest rates. monetary policy was tied to defending the exchange rate and while fiscal policy was tightened, it could not prevent the economy from overheating. high inflation and high cost pressures undermined competitiveness and the credibility of the fixed exchange rates. when monetary policy in germany was tightened following the reunification of east and west germany, high real interest rates spread within europe and the economic climate started to deteriorate. the situation intensified and speculation against the finnish markka contributed to finland allowing the markka to float in the autumn of 1992, after protracted resistance. the rising real interest rates, partly due to the defence of the exchange rate, aggravated the domestic situation. asset prices and gdp fell strongly while unemployment and the budget deficit increased rapidly. in consequence, finland suffered a severe banking crisis. other emu countries were also in recession in the early 1990s, but the depth of finland's recession was exceptional. to summarise, before finland's entry to the monetary union it was feared that

it was as high as 72 %. the euro was more accepted by men and young people than by women and senior citizens. one reply pattern in the surveys is especially worth mentioning. as late as in december 2001 a third of finns ( 34 % ) had not yet started to study euro prices at all. and an equal share of the finns considered that learning euro prices was the hardest thing about the changeover. today, almost five years later, we can observe that these citizens were right. learning euro prices was indeed the hardest thing and continues to be so. preparing the citizens for the euro three major campaigns when the euro was introduced as an account currency in 1999, a rather limited national campaign was run in finland. it was managed by the ministry of finance and co - financed by the eu. at the end of 1999, the ministry of finance started planning for the cash changeover. it chaired a group of authorities that ran the national campaign. the campaign was financed by the finnish government and the eu. ( 1996 to 2002 the campaign budget was seven million euro. ) in the end of 1999, the bank of finland initiated information efforts for the cash - changeover and started regular cooperation with the national campaign. ( the bank of finland spent about two million euro on its own euro information efforts. all in all, the financial resources allocated to the campaigns were quite modest. ) in most of the euro countries a special changeover board was established. it managed and / or supervised all preparations, including a single information campaign for the general public. in finland we took a more decentralised approach. there were three separate campaigns – each conducted by authorities with a special emphasis on their field of expertise. 1 ) a national campaign conducted by government authorities and the european commission. 2 ) a euro area - wide campaign conducted by the european central bank and the national central banks of the eurosystem. 3 ) the bank of finland's own campaign. the joint campaign of the ecb and the ncbs ( called euro 2002 campaign ) concentrated on the banknotes and coins themselves. the bank of finland complemented it with a finnish emphasis, providing training and details of the cash changeover. the national campaign informed the general public on the changeover process as a whole. it gave general information on the changes in shopping, banking transactions and other everyday - life activities. the national campaign also focused on the most vulnerable groups, such as the elderly, handicapped and immigrants. the approach of three campaigns had