Finland to Exceed NATO Spending Goal

Finnish Defence Minister Antti Häkkänen with French Armed Forces Minister Catherine Vautrin at the meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Defence Ministers’ Session on October 15, 2025 in Brussels | Photo: NATO

Finland is expected to exceed NATO’s 1.5 percent target for defence- and security-related spending in 2026 after the Finnish Government outlined additional categories of expenditure that can be counted under the alliance’s reporting framework.

The Finnish Ministry of Defence said spending reported under the target will include statutory readiness and preparedness duties, as well as capabilities considered critical to homeland defence that are maintained and developed by government branches outside the Ministry of Defence. These costs are estimated to amount to 2.4 percent of Finland’s gross domestic product in 2026.

Minister of Defence Antti Häkkänen, Minister of Defence of Finland, said, “Total defence is an essential element of Finland’s defence. Traditionally, Finland has always sought to ensure the resilience of our civil society, and now we have stepped up our efforts. The fact that we are able to exceed the NATO target already this year, the first year of reporting, shows that we take total defence seriously.”

At the 2025 NATO Summit in The Hague, NATO members committed to investing five percent of GDP annually on defence. The framework calls for at least 3.5 percent of GDP to be spent on core defence requirements, with up to 1.5 percent allocated to defence- and security-related spending. Member states are expected to meet the target by 2035.

According to the Finnish Ministry of Defence, Finland’s 3.5 percent target includes spending from the Ministry of Defence, parts of the Finnish Border Guard budget, military crisis management expenditure managed by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, and defence administration pension payments.

Minister of Defence Antti Häkkänen, Minister of Defence of Finland, said, “The 1.5 per cent target for defence- and security-related spending includes the costs of such activities as enabling the execution of operations plans, strengthening the defence industrial base, promoting innovation in the defence sector, safeguarding civil preparedness and resilience, and supporting Ukraine.”

The Ministry said exceeding the 1.5 percent target will not affect Finland’s obligation to reach NATO’s separate 3.5 percent core defence spending requirement.