The main tasks of the Representative Council are to:
- decide on adopting the financial statements,
- decide on the distribution of profit to the members,
- decide on discharging the Supervisory Board, Board or Directors and CEO/President and CEO from liability,
- elect the members of the Supervisory Board and the auditors and to decide on their fees.
A full member of Metsäliitto Cooperative may be elected to the Representative Council. Persons who are employed by Metsäliitto Cooperative or a Group company and who are members of the Metsäliitto Cooperative Supervisory Board or Board of Directors are not eligible to stand for election to the Representative Council.
The election of the Representative Council is carried out every fourth year by postal vote or a vote over a communications link or with some other technical device. Each member has one vote. The election is carried out by election districts such that as many representatives are selected from each district as the list of voters for the district in question includes Metsäliitto Cooperative members entitled to vote on 1 January of the election year, divided by 2,300 or part thereof. The election districts are confirmed by the Supervisory Board, and they are essentially determined in accordance with Metsäliitto Cooperative's district organisations.
Representative council's decision-making
In accordance with the rules, the Representative Council convenes once a year in the spring. The Representative Council, Supervisory Board or the Board Directors may decide to call an extraordinary meeting. An extraordinary meeting shall also be arranged if demanded by at least one tenth of the Representative Council members. Unless otherwise required by the Cooperatives Act for certain matters, the Representative Council is convened by the Supervisory Board no later than 7 days before the meeting with a written invitation to the meeting sent to every member of the Representative Council, which must include the matters to be discussed in the meeting.
Each member of the Representative Council has one vote in the meeting. Amending Metsäliitto Cooperative's rules requires the amendment proposal to be supported by a minimum of two thirds of the members participating in the meeting. In addition to the members of the Representative Council, the President and CEO of the Metsä Group, the Chair of the Board of Directors and, as a general rule, the members of the Board of Directors and Supervisory Board are present at meetings of the Representative Council. In addition to these, the auditors are also present at the annual meeting.