Breakdown of On tärkeää osallistua päätöksentekoon kaksi kertaa vuodessa.
olla
to be
kaksi
two
kerta
time
vuosi
year
Questions & Answers about On tärkeää osallistua päätöksentekoon kaksi kertaa vuodessa.
Why is päätöksentekoon in the illative case (ending in -on)?
The verb osallistua (to participate) is a verb of participation, which requires its target to be in the illative case (the "into" case). Even though in English we say "participate in", Finnish conceptually treats it as moving or entering into an activity.
Why is the adjective tärkeää in the partitive case here, rather than the nominative tärkeä?
When a sentence starts with "It is..." and the real subject of the sentence is an infinitive phrase (like osallistua päätöksentekoon), the describing adjective takes the partitive case. Because an action doesn't have a concrete physical boundary, Finnish treats it as an abstract, uncountable concept.
How is the word päätöksentekoon formed?
It is a compound word made of päätöksen (the genitive form of päätös, meaning "decision's") and tekoon (the illative form of teko, meaning "act" or "making"). Combined and inflected for the verb rection, it literally means "into the making of a decision".
Why do we use the inessive case for vuodessa instead of another time case?
To express how many times something happens within a specific period (frequency), Finnish uses the inessive case (-ssa or -ssä). So, kaksi kertaa vuodessa is the standard way to express "twice per year" or "two times in a year".