Volunteers will help their organic farm (harvesting/ threshing rice, planting vegetables, taking care of animals, etc.) and their house work especially cooking. Volunteers will also carry the things in the mountain to the Maki farm and harvest rice there. Be ready to work for quite a long time (05:30-18:00 with some brakes) and hard. It'd be surely good exercise to make your body more healthy!
Accomodation and food
Shared room in the building for the volunteers and a few members, 5 min. walk from the farm. Meals will be cooked by volunteers together with the community people by turns. Sleeping bag is not necessary. There is limited Wifi.
Location and leisure
Otari village is a small village located in the region of stunning natural beauty in the northern part of Nagano Prefecture, Japan. It is beautiful village near ÔÇ£Japanese Northern AlpsÔÇØ. It takes 40-50 min. by foot from Minami-Otari, the nearest train station. Exchange program, Excursion on a free day (possibly to Hakuba, a famous tourism spot), etc.
Project hosted by
This project is actively working for SDG 2 (Zero Hunger) and SDGs 10 (Reduced Inequalities), organized together with Kyodo Gakusha since 2015, a cooperative community where about people with various backgrounds such as mentally disadvantaged, people who are tired of city life, who wants to learn farming, just want to live in the nature, etc. They have 5 communities in Tokyo, Nagano and Hokkaido and grow animals and vegetables in ecological, organic way with utilizing bacterium and charcoal. Tateya Farm has 40 members and NICE started LMTV projects here since 2014. NICE also organizes workcamps and LMTV projects in Maki and Shintoku farms of Kyodo Gakusha.
*Outcome of this workcamp: In 2023, 1 mid term volunteer for 2 months greatly contributed to harvest rice which was difficult to finish by the time they needed without volunteers! There was also nice exchange between Community people and vols. through Yoga and Mindfulness. Please see the presentation of the camp leader for the IVS contest in Japan https://www.slideshare.net/nice-workcamp/e4-54764427 (only Japanese for the moment, but you can at least enjoy the pictures!)
Directions to meeting point
Additional comments
Similar type of communities in each country and their networking