November 05, 2025 | News | Research Funding
Six Million Euros for MigScene!
The social and economic sustainability of Finland and Helsinki is dependent on the skills, educational level and wellbeing of its citizens. © istockphoto.com/peeterv
Mikko Myrskylä, the director of the MPIDR and professor at the University of Helsinki, and his colleagues, Wolfgang Lutz, the founding director of the Wittgenstein Center for Demography, Mirkka Danielsbacka, professor at the University of Turku, and Anna Rotkirch, research professor at Family Federation of Finland, will receive six million euros over the next six years to do research on population projections for migration scenarios, human capital development, and sustainable integration (MigScene).
“The most important economic asset of a population is its human capital: the skills, educational level, and wellbeing of citizens. The development of human capital over decades is decisive for the social and economic sustainability of societies. Our projects create tools to understand this development, and provides solution-oriented information on how to best enhance the development under various migration scenarios”, says Mikko Myrskylä. Using Finnish and international microsimulation tools, survey and register data, and machine learning techniques the MigScene team presents a set of multidimensional population projections for Finland between 2025 and 2070, studies integration processes, employs methodological innovations, and enhances capacity to use projection tools.
The Research Council of Finland awarded funding to the University of Helsinki, with the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (MPIDR) as a key partner. Led by Mikko Myrskylä, the Helsinki-MPIDR team will receive 1.5 million euros, split evenly over the first and second three-year periods. Together with MPIDR scientists Jonas Schöley and Aapo Hiilamo, and colleagues from Helsinki, the project develops probabilistic population projection tools and long-term projections on economic sustainability. They will also help statistical offices, such as Statistics Finland, adopt the projection tools. The research project began in October 2025.
About the funding
In autumn, 2025, the Strategic Research Council (SRC) established within the Research Council of Finland has granted a total of 29 million euros for research supporting economic growth and the future of work. MigScene granted funding in the SRC program Skills, Labor Supply and Migration in Future Finland (SKILLS). The research to be conducted within the program examines ways and means to ensure a favorable development in Finnish society by securing a sufficient supply of labor and skills in the future. A total of eleven different research fields and 16 organizations are represented in the SKILLS consortia.