Masanobu Fukuoka: Japanese Organic Farmer
(Page 9 of 13)
July/August 1982
By the Mother Earth News staff.
It seems, also, that general recognition of the long-term dangers of chemical farming has helped renew interest in alternative methods of agriculture. Many people are looking at my methods and seeing that what they previously viewed as primitive and backward is perhaps instead far ahead of modern science!
RELATED CONTENT
Rate points out problems of cowkeeping today which were not appreciable a generation ago... and sug...
ONE THING YOU CAN DO READERS SHARE THEIR WAY TO HELP OUR EARTH-One person at a time April/May 1992 ...
THE AMAZING NATURAL FARM OF MASANOBU FUKUOKA July/August 1978 Masanobu Fukuoka may be one of the mo...
Keep your outdoor cats safe and warm in the winter with this three-bale insulated cat house. From t...
PLOWBOY: You practice a low-cost, low-labor method of growing food that requires no heavy machinery, fossil fuels, or processed chemicals . . . and yet achieves yields comparable to those of more "modern" scientific methods. That sounds almost like a dream come true. There must be people trying natural farming all over the place!
FUKUOKA: Not really . . . because my method does seem like a dream to them. In fact, I think natural farming is actually a very frightening concept to many people! It entails a revolutionary attitude that could change the whole climate of our society and our civilization.
PLOWBOY: What would it take, then, to convince such individuals to try your methods?
FUKUOKA: It would be very difficult for single farmers or families to get started by themselves. Natural agriculture requires a great deal of work in the beginning—until the land is brought back into balance—and you can't do it alone unless you have a lot of time to devote to the effort.
The change might be brought about more easily on a village or small-town level, but I really think the best way to start this "one-straw revolution", as I call it, is on a large scale . . . through some sort of cooperative effort. The government, the agricultural co-ops, the farmers, the consumers—in other words, everyone—must decide that this is the direction in which our society should go. And, of course, if we don't get that kind of cooperation, the possibility of bringing about significant change in our farming methods is remote.
Most important, we've got to revise people's concepts of nature. In America, especially, the outdoors that's seen often isn't natural at all . . . it's an imitation, man-made nature. For example, look around the grounds of this university. You'll see beautiful lawns, soft and comfortable, planted here and there with trees. The foliage is indeed lovely, but these aren't the trees and grasses that originally evolved here. They've been put here by human beings for the benefit of other human beings. The native plants were smothered or exterminated . . . and this nonnative, exotic lawn grass was nurtured instead. Allowing such an artificial landscape to return to its natural state would be good for human beings and for all the other animals and all the plants that live on this planet. However, not everyone would appreciate it . . . there'd be more flies, mosquitoes, and other insects that people don't find very pleasant, and some would say, "Oh, how inconvenient. What a bother!"
Page:
<< Previous 1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 | 9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
Next >>
