Tartu County - Economy

Economy

Tartu County is an integrated economic system and labour area with its centre in the City of Tartu.

There are 6000 companies and 2000 self-employed persons registered in Tartu County. More than 80% of the companies employ 10 or fewer people, only 5 companies in the whole region have more than 250 employees.

Service sector provides 2/3 of the employment in the county. The City of Tartu is the service and logistics centre for the whole of South Estonia. A significant part of these jobs are in the public sector – especially education and medicine – and the biggest employer in the county is Tartu University Clinics with around 3000 employees, incl 455 doctors. The biggest private sector employer is Tarmeko, producing furniture and components, with 900 employees. Unemployment rate in the county has been 2–3% in the recent years.

Typical products of Tartu County are furniture, foodstuffs, clothes, building materials, glass and plastics. The main export target countries are Finland, Germany, Latvia and Russia. 40% of the exports is wood and furniture, other export production includes machinery and appliances, building materials, glass and clothing. Thanks to the fertile lands, there are many big agricultural enterprises in the West of the county. Fishery is an important activity on the coast of Lake Peipsi.

There is development potential for knowledge intensive production in the region due to its universities. Some successful spin-offs of Tartu University are operating in the field of biotechnology and biomedicine. Since 2004, several ICT companies, orientated on the international markets, have been growing fast.

In order to facilitate innovation and technology transfer, Tartu Science Park is offering incubation and consultation services to research-based and high-tech oriented companies, and promoting cooperation between research institutions. Tartu University Institute of Technology is a research and development institution, which aims to facilitate the generation of new technological solutions. The R&D centres have been established in the areas of material and chemical technology, biomedical technology, environmental technology and information technology.

The key actors of the region have signed an agreement about the county's development strategy, which is economic and social development through increase of the knowledge input into production and services.

Economic development priorities:

1. Modernization of studying and working environment, technologies and methods in the schools and universities; internationalization of the universities; development of vocational and technical education;
2. support of entrepreneurship and start-ups, increase of knowledge input to the production;
3. improvement of living environment and social infrastructure of regional centres in the rural areas;
4. enhancement of international availability by roads, transport and communications networks.