The purpose of this thesis is development of plant production in Northern Finland. Temperature and short growing seasons are the major impacts on plant production in the North. Southern Finland has better growing conditions for plants to grow successfully than Northern Finland.

Climate change is expected to have a positive impact on Northern plant production. The cultivation possibilities of protein plants are expected to improve due to climate change. With the domestic cultivation of protein plants, we could increase Finland’s protein self-sufficiency. With the cultivation of protein plants, we will get many more advantages for the profitability of farming economy and decrease reliability of imported protein.

The thesis was ordered by Oulu University of Applied Sciences Department of Natural Resources. The purpose of the thesis was to produce a literature review of Northern Ostrobothnia’s cultivated protein plants, their growth demands and soil types, as well as to find out what kind of research results already exist in the area. Potentially even to find new plant species for cultivation. The final goal of this thesis was to find suitable plant species and varieties for the client’s field tests. The thesis consists of a literary survey and in addition two experts were interviewed. In the theoretical part the newest information about the field has been used and the research material used in this thesis were Natural Resources Institute Finland’ s official variety trial results from years 2010 – 2017 and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry’s newest basic- and growth information.

From the results it can be determined that in Northern Ostrobothnia protein plant cultivation is still low, although it has increased during the previous years. The area’s protein plant field testing has been weak and official field tests have not been done with field pea and faba bean. By executing field tests, it could be confirmed which plants are suitable to be cultivated in Northern Ostrobothnia.