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Utsjoki (; ; ; ; ) is a municipality in Finland, the northernmost in the country. It is in Lapland and borders Norway as well as the municipality of Inari. The municipality was founded in 1876. It has a population of () and covers an area of of which is water. The population density is .
Utsjoki has two official languages: Finnish language and Northern Sami. It is the municipality in Finland with the largest portion of official Sami languages speakers; of the population. Ethnically, 54.6% of the population were Sami in 2019, making Utsjoki the only municipality in Finland with Sami majority.
The border with Norway follows the river Teno, which flows into the Arctic Sea. The northernmost village in Finland and in the European Union is Nuorgam.
Utsjoki is at the northern end of highway 4, the longest highway in Finland. The European route E75 runs along the Sami Bridge and continues on to Norway.
The Kevo nature reserve is located within the municipality. It covers a territory of and there is a hiking trail. The trail partly follows the edge of the Kevo gorge.
"The name Utsjoki comes from Northern Sami Ohcejohka, but the origin of that name is unknown", according to website Fennica.pohjoiseen.fi. Utsjoki. Fennica.pohjoiseen.fi. Retrieved 2023-06-2023.
Extremely low temperatures and low precipitation result in thin snow cover throughout the winters. The wind velocity strongly increases with higher elevations, and this has a major effect on the distribution of the snow. The exposed hilltops usually have no snow cover during winter. This leads to the cooling of the ground and the development of permafrost.
Permafrost has been found in many palsa mires in the Kevo and Utsjoki regions. After detailed studies on palsas, researchers were convinced until 1982 that "so far, permafrost has been found, and probably exists only, in mires in the cores of palsas". The permafrost core in palsas is easy to detect by digging or sounding with a steel rod, and the frozen ground necessitates modern geophysics for geoelectrical soundings. They allow measurement of the thickness of frozen bedrock due to its higher specific electrical resistance.
Matti Seppälä (1941-2020) was undoubtedly the foremost expert on palsas. Based on existing innovative research in Scandinavia he suggested to look for the general permafrost distribution in the mountains also in northernmost Finland. The field campaign in summer 1985 in Utsjoki was supported by the Academy of Finland, the University of Helsinki and the German Research Foundation. The results were quite surprising for most scientists in Finland. Above the timber line, a minimum permafrost thickness of ten to fifty meters was recorded with geoelectrical soundings.
The Puollamoaivi mountain (432 m high) is located some 13 km NE of the Kevo Subarctic Research Station. Close to the Skallovarri palsa mire about 290 m a. s. I., an estimated permafrost thickness of over 100 meters may be expected at an altitude of 360 m, just 30–70 m higher than the surface of the palsa mire. It is concluded therefore that all sites on the crest of Skallovarri (Puollamoaivi) show the existence of permafrost, but its thickness seems to be different. These findings were confirmed with similar results in the adjacent Peldojoki, Hietatievat, Peera sites, where permafrost exists in debris as well as in bedrock. This is also of importance in the construction business, e.g. for deep foundations for telecommunication masts.
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