Tarja Halonen, former President of Finland, will visit Seoul to attend the 5th Asia Future Forum as a keynote speaker.


The forum, hosted by Hankyoreh Media Group, will be held on Oct. 22-23.
Halonen is the leader who brought prosperity to ‘the Small but Strong Finland’. During her presidency,
Halonen was also named one of the 100 Most Powerful Women in the world due to leading Finland to the top position
in the Corruption Perceptions Index by Transparency International, Global Competitiveness Report, an OECD Program for International Student Assessment(PISA),
and Environmental Performance Index. Since she gave special treatment to women, minorities and the working class
with her Equality and Welfare policies, Halonen won broad support across the country. Halonen was originally elected over 50% of the popular vote, and was reelected for a second term. In the last year of her term as president, she had a support rating of over 80%.

She is known for being friendly, like a next door neighbor, which earned her the nickname ‘Moomin mamma’ after a Finnish character.
The nickname is an indication of her humble personality, based on her acts including ironing and styling herself without an assistant or
other special treatment when she made an official visit to Korea as president in 2000. Helonen says that a leader is not a person
who makes change, but who encourages people to create changes. She will deliver the keynote speech on.
‘Cooperation of Business & Society for People-centered Economy’ at the opening of AFF.

KIM Hoeseoung (honesty@hani.co.kr)
Researcher, Hankyoreh Economic Research Institute