A paddy field is a flooded parcel of arable land used for growing rice and other semiaquatic crops. Rice can also be grown in dry-fields, but from the twentieth century paddy field agriculture became the dominant form of growing rice. Paddy fields are a typical feature of rice-growing countries of east, south and southeast Asia, including Cambodia, Bangladesh, China, Taiwan, India, Indonesia, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam, and Laos. They are also found in other rice-growing regions such as Piedmont (Italy), the Camargue (France) the Artibonite Valley (Haiti), the Sacramento Valley of California, and the remains of rice paddies still define much of landscape of the Carolina Lowcountry (US).
Paddy fields can be built adjacent to otherwise natural areas such as rivers or marshes. They can be constructed, often on steep hillsides with much labor and materials. The fields require large quantities of water for irrigation. Flooding provides water essential to the growth of the crop. Water also provides a favorable environment for the rice strains being grown as well as discouraging the growth of many species of weeds. Thewater buffalo is one of the most important working animals adapted for life in wetlands so they are extensively used in paddy fields.
World methane production due to paddy fields has been estimated to be in the range of 50 to 100 million tonnes per annum.[1] Recent studies have shown that methane can be significantly reduced while also boosting crop yield by draining the paddies allowing the soil to aerate, which interrupts methane production.[2]
The word "paddy" is derived from the Malay word padi, rice plant.
Archaeologists generally accept that wet-field cultivation originated in China. At Caoxieshan, a site of the Neolithic Majiabang culture, archaeologists excavated paddy fields [4]. Some archaeologists claim that Caoxieshan may date to 4000-3000 B.C.[5][6], but as of now the oldest excavated rice paddy field dated by absolute scientific dating techniques are from Korea[7]. There is archaeological evidence that unhusked rice was stored for the military and for burial with the deceased from the Neolithic period to the Han Dynasty in China.[8]
Korean paddy-field farming is ancient. A pit-house at the Daecheon-ni site yielded carbonized rice grains and radiocarbon dates indicating that rice cultivation in dry-fields may have begun as early as the Middle Jeulmun Pottery Period (c. 3500-2000 B.C.) in the Korean Peninsula[9]. Ancient paddy fields have been carefully unearthed in Korea by institutes such as Kyungnam University Museum (KUM) of Masan. They excavated paddy field features at the Geumcheon-ni Site near Miryang, South Gyeongsang Province. The paddy field feature was found next to a pit-house that is dated to the latter part of the Early Mumun Pottery Period (c. 1100-850 B.C.). KUM has conducted excavations that have revealed similarly dated paddy field features at Yaeum-dong and Okhyeon in modern-day Ulsan[10].
The earliest Mumun features were usually located in low-lying narrow gullies that were naturally swampy and fed by the local stream system. Some Mumun paddy fields in flat areas were made of a series of squares and rectangles separated by bunds approximately 10 cm in height, while terraced paddy fields consisted of long irregular shapes that followed natural contours of the land at various levels[11][12].
Mumun Period rice farmers used all of the elements that are present in today's paddy fields such terracing, bunds, canals, and small reservoirs. We can grasp some paddy-field farming techniques of the Middle Mumun (c. 850-550 B.C.) from the well-preserved wooden tools excavated from archaeological rice fields at the Majeon-ni Site. However, iron tools for paddy-field farming were not introduced until sometime after 200 B.C. The spatial scale of paddy-fields increased with the regular use of iron tools in the Three Kingdoms of Korea Period (c. A.D. 300/400-668).
The first paddy fields in Japan date to the Early Yayoi period[13]. The Early Yayoi has been re-dated and thus it appears that wet-field agriculture developed at approximately the same time as in the Korean peninsula.
In the Philippines, the use of rice paddies can be traced to prehistoric times, as evidenced in the names of towns such as Pila, Laguna, whose name can be traced to the straight mounds of dirt that form the boundaries of the rice paddy, or "Pilapil." [14]
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