What Is Nature Farming?

Nature Farming is a farming method for producing healthy quality crops abundantly by allowing the soil to exert its power to the maximum without using pesticides and chemical fertilizers. It was first advocated in 1935 by Mokichi Okada (1882 ~ 1955), a philosopher and religious leader. His philosophy and principle of Nature Farming are as follows.

Philosophy: Respect nature and conform to its laws.
Principle: Allow the living soil to exert its great power.

Based on these ideas, Nature Farming aims to sustainably produce crops by deriving the intrinsic power of nature heading for affluent living things without using chemical fertilizers and pesticides (both synthetic and natural), which disturb the ecosystem. It values the role of every living thing and improves the matter cycle function by enhancing the farmland ecosystem so that nature can exert its functions more. The farming method has been succeeded and practiced by those who have sympathized with Okada’s ideas even through the times of frequently using chemical fertilizers and pesticides. Today, more people are concerned with food safety than before, and influences of pesticides and chemical fertilizers on the environment, including ourselves, are widely recognized in the society. Nature Farming is now more demanded to protect the environment and our health.

INFRC has set the following five requirements for the desirable form of Nature Farming.

1. To produce high quality food to enhance human health.
2. To be economically and spiritually beneficial to both farmers and consumers.
3. To be practiced easily and to be sustainable.
4. To conform to nature and to protect the environment.
5. To produce enough food for an expanding world population.

How Do We Perceive Nature?

Many people think that “natural” means a condition which has not been modified or treated by human beings and thus that nature farming is a farming method in which human beings do not do anything and let crops to grow on their own. Nature Farming, we promote, however, is not such a method. It is a farming method in which human beings properly and actively work on the soil and crops while avoiding the use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers.

Nature is equipped with the directionality in which more living things are richly harmonized with each other and with complex and ingenious mechanisms to support it. Nature meant by the word “Nature Farming” is not nature simply seen by our eyes but includes such various mechanisms and functions lying in it.

Basic Approaches in Nature Farming

There are some basic approaches in Nature Farming.

1. Respect and Learn from Nature

The ingenious mechanisms of nature cannot be understood simply by looking at it. It is necessary first to closely observe nature.

Why do roots, stems and leaves develop from a tiny seed and flowers bloom? Why do countless trees grow on mountains? We can only understand part of nature and its complicate mechanisms.

Nevertheless, we tend to look upon some plants, insects and microorganisms as evils, considering only our convenience, and try to eliminate them as weeds, pests or pathogens. They, however, all have some roles within the great mechanisms of nature. Therefore, it is necessary not to look upon them as our enemies but to consider their roles in nature.

There are three principles in observing nature.

1. Listen to the silent voices of the soil and crops with love.
2. Actively work on nature and sincerely learn from the result.
3. Always keep in mind that everything in nature has the meaning of existence.

2. Reconsider Our Relationship with Nature

Human beings do not live in the same way as other animals do. We are equipped with ability to improve ourselves and words to share our knowledge and experiences. We can produce our food by cultivating the soil and raising animals. On the other hand, we can kill other living things and destroy nature by spreading artificial chemicals, which are products of our knowledge and experiences.

To benefit abundantly from nature, it is necessary to relate ourselves properly with nature. What we are required now is to relate ourselves with nature without contradicting nature and placing too much load on the environment. For this, we need to understand nature’s principle of more living things harmonizing more richly with each other. It allows us to realize that we are a part of nature and are allowed to live by nature.

We can harvest rice from a paddy field four hundred times the amount of rice grains sown in the field, because we grow seedlings and cultivate them in a properly managed paddy field. Paddy fields also serve as places to breed for insects and animals, such as dragonflies, contributing to affluence in nature.

3. Derive Functions of Nature

It is necessary to understand the mechanisms of nature and to derive their functions “to allow the soil to exert its power,” or the principle of Nature Farming. The largest mechanism of nature is “the circulation through living things.”

During the 3.5 billion years after life forms appeared on earth, there were many drastic climate changes and geophysical activities. Although many living things were perished each time, nature repeatedly allowed more living things to flourish.

The main role in the flourishment were played by plants, small animals and microorganisms. Plants and some microorganisms synthesize sugar, protein or lipids by fixing solar energy. Animals and insects feed on such sugar and protein. Dead bodies of plants and animals are decomposed by small animals and microorganisms and returned to the soil to be used as nutrients for plants. This circulation of matter has produced a variety of living things abundantly and formed rich soils. We human beings have been born and live in this circulation mediated by living things

Today, this circulation is disrupted in various places, and the soil is less seen in cities. Even in rural villages, which were supposed to have rich nature, the use of various pesticides and chemical substances has caused a drastic decrease of small animals and microorganisms, which play important roles in the circulation.

Our lives are full of petrochemical products, and we eat farm products imported from distant countries and produce a large amount of waste without placing it in the circulation. It is now necessary for us to realize that we have been allowed to live within the circulation and chain of life forms.

Circulation of matter, energy and life mediated by living things

Principles of Production

The circulation of matter mediated by living things is also a chain of life forms. Our life is supported by the life of other plants and animals.

For us to live healthy and rich lives, plants and animals supporting our lives also need to be healthy and full of life. The main purpose of Nature Farming is to produce crops which are healthy and full of life and to supply them to consumers.

Since crops are a source of our lives, they must be safe and be produced stably. A productive soil has a developed structure, is mellow, is equipped with a moderate water permeability and drainage as well as a good water-holding capacity, retains fertilizer well and contains many and various soil microorganisms. Such soils can be seen in forests and lake areas. We think it is most important to nurture soil,* in which good humus in the soil is increased and rich soil organisms are nurtured. To nurture soil, it is indispensable to utilize unused resources in the local area and to produce organic matter during fallow periods. * In Nature Farming, “soil nurturing” is used to mean “to grow a living soil,” rather than the ordinary word “soil conditioning.”

In addition, it is also necessary to use seeds which have the vital power to produce offsprings even in severe environments, to cultivate crops in seasons suitable to their physiology and to try not to depend on production materials and chemical materials.

Keys to Cultivation for Stable Crop Production

Principles of Production

Many people think that “natural” means a condition which has not been modified or treated by human beings and thus that nature farming is a farming method in which human beings do not do anything and let crops to grow on their own. Nature Farming, we promote, however, is not such a method. It is a farming method in which human beings properly and actively work on the soil and crops while avoiding the use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers.

Nature is equipped with the directionality in which more living things are richly harmonized with each other and with complex and ingenious mechanisms to support it. Nature meant by the word “Nature Farming” is not nature simply seen by our eyes but includes such various mechanisms and functions lying in it.