Background
The project was established after Trondheim kommune experienced strong growth in service use for younger service users. This growth exceeded demographic developments and created challenges for planning and budgeting. The municipality lacked sufficiently robust models to understand the drivers behind the increasing demand and to project future service needs accurately.
The project therefore aimed to answer two main questions:
- What is driving the development in service needs among younger user groups?
- And how can the municipality improve its forecasting models to produce more precise and sustainable estimates?
Analyses and literature reviews
SINTEF contributed with both qualitative and quantitative analyses. We conducted interviews with service managers to identify hypotheses about cost drivers, performed extensive analyses of administrative system data from 2013–2021, and carried out a broad literature review. SINTEF also developed concrete recommendations for new forecasting principles. Through this work, SINTEF delivered a research based knowledge foundation that provides the municipality with a far more precise and robust tool for future planning.
Photo: Shutterstock/Ivan Moreno sl