FUKUOKA MASANOBU

Fukuoka- The Man of "Do-Nothing Farming"

"The ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops,but the cultivation and perfection of human beings."
Masanobu Fukuoka

Masanobu Fukuoka (Fukuoka Masanobu February 2, 1913 – August 16, 2008) author of The One-Straw Revolution, The Road Back to Nature and The Natural Way Of Farming, was one of the pioneers of no-till grain cultivation/ Do-Nothing Farming. His system is referred to as "natural farming", Fukuoka Farming, or the Fukuoka Method. In India, natural farming is often referred to as "Rishi Kheti."

Masanobu Fukuoka was in a small farming village on the island of Shikoku in Southern Japan. He was educated in microbiology and worked as a soil scientist specializing in plant pathology, but at the age of twenty-five he began to have doubts about the "wonders of modern agriculture science." He eventually quit his job and returned to his family's farm. From that point on he devoted his life to developing a unique small scale organic farming system that does not require weeding, pesticide or fertilizer applications, or tilling.

Fukuoka's agricultural approach is simplicity itself. Instead of planting seeds and transplanting seedlings as in traditional rice cultivation, he broadcasts clay pellets containing seeds on unplowed soil, sufficiently loosened by nature's own undercover agents, the earthworm and other such creatures.

The use of white clover reduces the amount of time the field is flooded for rice to one week. Weeds are allowed to sprout, controlled by nature's checks and balances, including natural predators, which also take care of pests. "Nature, left alone, is in perfect balance," asserts Fukuoka with a confidence that comes from personal experience. Each rice stalk yields 200 to 300 grains, which compares very favorably with the yield of other forms of cultivation; labor is cut to one-fifth.

He also grew vegetables and fruits for market using similar techniques.

In his 60's, Fukuoka sat down to document what he had seen and done. In 1975 his first book "One Straw Revolution" was released and has had a profound impact on agriculture and human consciousness all over the world. "One Straw Revolution" was followed by "The Natural Way of Farming" and then by "The Road Back To Nature."Since 1979, Fukuoka has been touring, giving lectures and sowing the seeds of natural farming all over the world. In 1988 he was given Deshikottan Award, and the Ramon Magsaysay Award. In 1997 he received the Earth Council Award.

To Masanobu Fukuoka, raising food is not necessarily the primary goal of farming.

“Why do you have to develop? If economic growth rises from 5% to 10%, is happiness going to double? What’s wrong with a growth rate of 0%? Isn’t this a rather stable kind of economics? Could there be anything better than living simply and taking it easy?”

- Masanobu Fukuoka
The One-Straw Revolution, 1978