Masanobu Fukuoka

Masanobu Fukuoka (1913–2008) was a Japanese farmer and philosopher who developed a low-intervention approach to agriculture known as natural farming and wrote The One-Straw Revolution.

Natural farming: An approach to agriculture that minimizes soil disturbance and synthetic inputs while relying on ecological processes. Fukuoka’s best-known contribution became one influential form of natural farming.
Minimal tillage: A soil-management approach that reduces the frequency or intensity of mechanical cultivation. Fukuoka’s refusal to plow was more absolute than many reduced-tillage systems.
The One-Straw Revolution: Masanobu Fukuoka’s 1975 book presenting his philosophy and practice of natural farming. This book brought his farming method and critique of modern agriculture to an international audience.
Rachel Carson: An American marine biologist and author whose 1962 book Silent Spring exposed the harms of pesticides. Her pesticide critique and Fukuoka’s farming practice both challenged chemical-intensive agriculture.
Conventional agriculture: Agriculture that commonly relies on mechanized cultivation, selected crop varieties, and purchased chemical inputs. Fukuoka rejected routine plowing, chemical fertilizers, and pesticides used in many conventional systems.
No-till farming: Crop production that avoids mechanically turning the soil between plantings. Fukuoka treated avoiding plowing as a core way to let soil structure recover.
Direct seeding: Sowing seeds directly in their growing location instead of raising and transplanting seedlings. He broadcast seed into fields rather than relying on conventional nursery and transplant routines.
Natural farming in Japan: Japanese agricultural practices that minimize intervention and draw on ecological processes. Fukuoka’s methods developed within a Japanese agricultural context and drew attention there and abroad.
Wendell Berry: An American writer and farmer who argues for local, ecologically grounded agriculture. Berry and Fukuoka offer distinct critiques of industrial farming rooted in practical agricultural life.
Green Revolution: The mid-twentieth-century spread of high-yield crop varieties, irrigation, fertilizers, and pesticides. Its input-intensive model contrasts with Fukuoka’s attempt to produce food through fewer interventions.

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