Keep our news free from ads and paywalls by making a donation to support our work!
Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and is published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.
Finland is planning to end domestic production of its passports and instead print them in Poland, resulting in the loss of 160 jobs, according to Finnish media reports.
By doing so, it will join the list of countries that produce their passports in Poland, which includes the United Kingdom, Armenia and Lithuania.
🇫🇮🫂🇵🇱 Finland has entrusted the production of its passports to Poland – Poland will produce passports for Finnish citizens. pic.twitter.com/pP7a7cHzQp
— Intermarium 24 (@intermarium24) June 12, 2025
Thales, the French company currently responsible for printing Finland’s passports, told Taloussanomat, a Finnish business daily, that it will improve efficiency and reduce operating costs by moving production to its facility in Tczew in northern Poland.
However, around 130 employees will remain at the Finnish facility in Vantaa, where Thales has been producing passports since 2017. That is because personalisation (adding the passport holder’s personal details) as well as sales, marketing, and research and development activities will continue in the Nordic country.
Finnish passports were formerly made in the Netherlands until domestic production resumed in 2017.
Finland will join the UK in having its passports produced in Poland, where Thales has printed the country’s post-Brexit blue passports since 2020. Similarly, those documents are personalised in the UK for security reasons.
Meanwhile, the Polish Security Printing Works (PWPW) – a state company responsible for producing Poland’s banknotes, passports and ID cards, among other documents – announced in December 2024 that it had taken over production of Lithuania’s passports and excise tax stamps.
In recent years, the PWPW has manufactured passports for Armenia, Bangladesh, Honduras, Moldova and Iceland. It formerly printed Lithuanian passports between 2007 and 2009.
Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.
Main image credit: Santeri Viinamäki/Wikimedia Commons (under CC BY-SA 4.0)
Agata Pyka is an Assistant Editor at Notes from Poland. She specialises in Central and Eastern European affairs, cybersecurity, and investigative reporting. She holds a master’s degree in political communication from the University of Amsterdam, and her work has appeared in Euractiv, the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN), and The European Correspondent, among others.
