Farm Saved Seed fee

The Farm Saved Seed (FSS) license fee is charged when the farmer uses a protected variety for seed multiplication purposes. The fee, or remuneration, ensures that plant breeding is able to produce varieties that are better yielding, have better quality and that are suitable for Finnish conditions. Collecting the remuneration is based on the Finnish Plant Breeders' Right Act (1279/2009).

The fee is collected from protected varieties of oat, barley, rye, wheat, triticale, pea, faba bean and potato.

Plant breeders and their representatives operating in Finland have authorised the Finnish Seed Trade Association (FSTA) to organise the invoicing of the fee from farmers. FSTA forwards the collected payments to the breeders and their representatives according to the variety hectares.

The farmer organisations MTK and SLC and the Finnish Seed Trade Association representing plant breeders have agreed on the fee level. In this role, the farmer organisations represent the farming community in general, regardless of whether the farmer in question is a member of the organisation or not. An agreement between the organisations ensures that the fee level is reasonable and fair for farmers.

For the harvest year 2025, the fee for cereals and legumes is 6.05 euros/ha + VAT and for potatoes 25.10 euros/ha + VAT.

FSTA has made a slide deck explaining the system and you can find it here.