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This article examines ways of combining quantitative and qualitative analysis concerning the regional economic impacts and meanings of culture. The role of cultural activity in detail has been examined from various points of view. On the one hand, there are a great number of studies concentrating on the quantifiable impacts of regional cultural activity, and on the other hand there is a large body of qualitative research focusing on the indirect and tertiary meanings of regional cultural activity and issues such as clustering, networking, the image of cities etc. This study combines both of these views by examining the case of the Seinäjoki rhythm music cluster. Quantitative analysis was conducted with computable general equilibrium (CGE) modelling. In addition, qualitative specialist interviews, a workshop and a light survey were conducted. It can be said that the qualitative and quantitative sides of a multi-disciplinary combination of methods supported each other during the study. The qualitative view made it possible to understand the background, scope and tertiary meanings of the phenomenon and helped to interpret hard numerical data and reference points provided by the CGE modelling. However, it became evident that it is very difficult to create genuinely cross-disciplinary research setting.

Regional economic impacts of fishing and hunting in Finland A state enterprise, Metsähallitus, administers state-owned land and water areas in Finland covering approximately 12 million hectares. One of the official administrative duties of Metsähallitus is to provide hunting and fishing opportunities for citizens. In 2013, more than 81,000 hunting licenses and 71,000 fishing licenses were granted. As indicated in the study, during one season, Metsähallitus hunting and fishing customers spent over EUR 33 million in the regions of licenses destinations. This paper indicates that hunters and fishers in Finland travel extensively and support the regional economy via their expenditures. In the summer and autumn of 2013, Metsähallitus carried out a survey that provided rich and up-to-date information that could be used for quantitative and qualitative research. For modelling purposes the private expenditures of hunters and fishers were grouped into trade, accommodation, restaurants, local public transport, and entertainment. However, the study also analysed these expenditures in more detail, presenting the personal expenditures per trip, per day of a trip, and per license. Moreover, the location of the expenditures was disaggregated into the region of license destination, the region of residence, and "on the way" between those two. For example, an average grouse hunter with a short-time (1?7 days) license in 2013 spent around EUR 150 per hunting trip within his or her region of residence, and more than EUR 440 per trip if the hunting area was located outside the region of residence. RegFin, a comparative-static regional Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) model was used in this study to calculate the wider economic impacts at a regional level, as well as to serve as an engine for an Excel-based assessment tool. The assessment of the regional economic impacts focused on basic economic indicators such as regional gross domestic product (GDP), household consumption, and employment. The results of the study indicate that hunting and fishing activities have a positive impact on regional economies. Just considering license destination regions in 2013, hunting and fishing on state-owned land increased regional GDP by EUR 6.4 million, created 86.2 person working years, and produced household consumption of EUR 36.6 million. Among the many conclusions, it was found that investments in regional services linked to hunting and fishing activities would increase the regional economic impacts of Metsähallitus customers.

Finnish national climate and energy strategy sets the share of renewables in energy use to 38%, and a significant amount of this should be covered by biomass based energy. In 2020 forestry is set to contribute 24 TWh and agriculture 4-5 TWh to energy production. In particular, bioenergy resources are considerable in the rural areas. However, the regional aspects have gone without investigation before this study. This study is a general equilibrium analysis. We considered only the by-products and waste material from agriculture and forestry as the resources for bioenergy, and only heat and power production were considered as the potential end uses. A regional CGE-model (RegFinDynBio) was used to analyse the impact of increased use of bioenergy potential. Increase in bioenergy use will lower the levels of GDP and employment marginally but will, nevertheless, help to achieve the emission reduction goals. However, the regional results showed the uneven distribution of the costs. The regions that beforehand seemed to be the most promising ones fared the worst. Southern Ostrobothnia was the sole exception, because of its bioenergy export income. The greatest difficulties are seen in Kainuu. Eastern Uusimaa shows significant losses as well, but they can be traced back to the region's economic structure, which is heavily dependent on fossil fuel refining industries. Some regions that use gas as energy source are seen to gain marginally because of their more diverse energy production system.