Regenerating Bali’s Rice Landscapes

Bali’s rice paddies are more than food. They are culture, ecology, and community.

Together with farmers, academics, students and hospitality, we’re restoring these landscapes through deep regenerative farming.

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Rice farming worldwide must transform.

Since the 1970s, the global shift to chemical-intensive farming has come at a high cost. Soils are degrading, yields are falling, ecosystems are collapsing, and farmer livelihoods are shrinking.

What’s needed now is a new way forward: one that secures harvests, restores ecosystems, and inspires the next generation to see farming as a future worth embracing.

Learn About Our Mission

From soil to livelihoods, regeneration in action

Astungkara Way leads Bali’s largest paddy ecosystem restoration program. With a holistic approach and global academic partners, we are building a replicable model proving that regenerative rice farming is the way forward for food, farmers, and the planet.

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What we do

Listen to communities

Engaging farmers and co-designing regenerative programs that reflect their needs and traditions.

Train farmers in regenerative practices

Restoring soil, ecosystems, and livelihoods.

Support better yields and incomes

By working with nature, cutting input costs, improving harvests.

Connect to markets

Through our Regenerative Hospitality Network, ensuring farmers have stable, premium buyers.

Measure impact

Soil tests, farmer incomes, yields, and ecosystem health, reported transparently.

How Regenerative Rice Farming Works

Regenerative rice isn’t theory. At Astungkara Way, we partner with global leading research teams and apply Complex Rice Systems (CRS), developed over the last 15 years by Dr. Uma Khumairoh together with her teams from Wageningen University (Netherlands) and Brawijaya University (Indonesia).

Building on proven farm-level trials in East Java, we’re bringing regenerative rice to the landscape level in Bali – and beyond.

The transition away from chemicals takes one to two years, a calendar we set with the farmers. Step by step, they introduce plants and animals that work with the rice – such as ducks, border plants, and azolla fern – to reduce chemical inputs until none are needed. As ecological balance returns, soils revive, water clears, biodiversity thrives, and yields remain strong.

Border plants & flowers

Habitat for beneficial insects and pollinators, reducing reliance on pesticides. Also provide significant additional revenue for farmers.

Azolla ferns

Floating nitrogen-fixing plants that enrich soils, limit weeds and provide duck feed.

Ducks in the paddies

Natural pest control, weed management, and fertilization. Also provide farmers with additional revenue (meat, eggs).

Compost & biofertilizers

Turning rice straw residue and border plants into compost, closing nutrient cycles and bringing soil life back.

Water stewardship

Natural water filtration to keep rice healthy, resilient and nutritious for consumers while promoting healthy soil biology.

Our mission

7.000 ha
10% of Bali's rice paddies transition to regenerative
by 2030

Since January 2023, Astungkara Way has united farmers, researchers, and youth to grow a Regenerative Rice Farming movement from the heart of Bali.

We provide farmers with free training, micro-financing and market access, to fully de-risk the transition for them.

We are starting by running trials across Bali and collecting extensive data to prove that it is the most viable method, not just for farmers but for consumers and ecosystems.

Our first group of partner farmers, paving the way for scale-up in 2026:

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202 farmers

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18 hectares of paddy

8 Tonnes of nutritious rice grown per month

8 farmer cooperative partners

HELP US ACCELERATE

This movement was initiated through an international collaboration:

reNature

reNature provided the agriculture expertise through a partnership with Wageningen and Brawijaya Universities, data collection methodology and project management.

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Zerofoodprint Asia

Zerofoodprint Asia provided funding to set up the initial "Model Farms", to test and measure the method's effectiveness. They offer a simple way for hotels and restaurants to support regenerative agriculture.

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Restaurants and hotels

Establishments of all sizes in Bali serve our Regenerative Rice to their customers, who are informed of the importance of supporting this unique movement.