Characterization of Innovation Situation in a Remote Rural Region

Innovation debates dealing with regional economic development have generally focused on densely populated,technologically advanced areas and areas around universitycities, undervaluing rural regions and their integration innational innovation systems. However, some statistics indicate that remote and rural regions may also have goodinnovation potential. This study examines more closely theinnovation situation of the firms located in a remote ruralregion in Finland. The study is based on a structured surveyincluding four main questions describing the innovationsituation in the firms. The study outlines the most importantfeatures regarding the innovation, correlations between themain results and differences between the firm size categoriesand sectors. In general, the results indicate, e.g., highimportance of a firm’s own innovation activities, and revealsome marketing goals of innovation and financial barriers. Acorrelation analysis reveals several significant correlationsbetween the main results of the survey