The Apatani fish-in-field tradition: aquaculture that never floods a paddy

In the Apatani valley’s terraced fields, rice and fish share the same water: fingerlings released at planting grow fat on the field’s insects and return as protein at harvest.

The system, centuries old, is being studied by aquaculture researchers as a model of water-efficient protein production.

The Apatani have a word for the symbiosis, and no translation: the field is not a field if it does not feed both.