kotimaisen

Kotimaisen is the genitive singular form of the Finnish adjective kotimainen, meaning domestic, homegrown, or native in relation to a country. The base form kotimainen is used before nouns to indicate origin from the home country; in other cases the word inflects like other Finnish adjectives (nominative: kotimainen; genitive: kotimaisen; partitive: kotimaista; etc.). The term is widely used in economics, politics, and everyday language to describe products, industries, or content produced within Finland or another country.

In practice, kotimaisen qualifies nouns such as tuotanto (kotimaisen tuotannon), elokuvateollisuus (kotimaisen elokuvateollisuuden), maito (kotimaisen maidon), or tuotteet (kotimaiset tuotteet when used as a predicate or in plural). The related noun kotimaisuus denotes the degree of domestic origin, for example kotimaisuusaste or labeling kotimainen tuote. The nuance is that kotimainen emphasizes origin within the country, whereas suomalainen more directly indicates nationality or ethnicity.

Examples include: "Kotimaisen tuotteen ostaminen tukee suomalaista taloutta." "Kotimaisen elokuvateollisuuden kehitys on haasteellista." "Ostan kotimaista maitoa." Etymology: kotimainen derives from koti 'home' with the derivational suffix -mainen, and has related forms such as ulkomainen meaning foreign.