The Finnish state granted the citizenship of the country to 9,501 people in the last 12 months for which public data exist, this is between April 2018 and March 2019. During the same period, another 1,696 applicants received a negative decision from the immigration authorities.
These figures have been collected from the statistics system of the Finnish Immigration Service (Migri). The numbers analyzed show that of the 11,197 requests processed in the last 12 months, there were 10,070 requests of citizenship by application and 1,127 requests of citizenship by declaration.
Age and gender groups
Citizenship applications received by gender. Source: Finnish Immigration Service (Migri).
The majority of applicants for citizenship in the last year were female: in total, there were 5,742 requests made by women, compared to 5,454 issued by men.
Women also outnumbered men (in this case long) in positive decisions: 5,077 female applicants achieved the Finnish citizenship compared to 4,423 male. As regards the rejected, in this period there were 665 female citizenship applicants who got a negative decision, while 1,031 were male.
Migri also counted an applicant of 'unknown' gender, who got a positive decision.
Applicants of Finnish citizenship by age. Source: Finnish Immigration Service (Migri).
In relation to age groups, the vast majority of applications for citizenship processed (7,991) were for people of adult age. Among them, the most numerous groups were those between 18 and 34 years old (3,851 applications) and between 35 and 65 years old (3,785) applications.
Among those who were rejected, the largest group is of those between 35 and 64 years old (with 645 negative decisions). They are followed by the applicants between 18 and 34 years old (who accumulated 498 rejections). For those over 65, the authorities issued 58 negative decisions.
There were also 3,206 requests of citizenship for minors (2,650 for children between 0 and 13 years and 556 for kids between 14 and 17). Of them, 2,711 received a positive response while other 495 were rejected.
By nationality
There are 8 nationalities out of 140 that account for more than half of the applications processed: Russian Federation, Somalia, Iraq, Estonia, Afghanistan, Sweden, the Islamic Republic of Iran and Kosovo. Together they add 5,768 applications to the 11,197 total requests.
Top twelve main nationalities in terms of applicants for Finnish citizenship. Source: Finnish Immigration Service (Migri).
Regarding the number of applications rejected, there are four nationalities that take the majority: Irak (316 rejections), Somalia (253), Afghanistan (173) and the Russian Federation (125). Together they add 867 rejected petitions, 51.12% of the total 1,696 denied applications.
The two main groups (Iraqis and Somalis) accumulated 569 applications rejected in the last 12 months, more than one third (33.54%) of the total number of rejections (1,696).
