Collection: Tatsuhiko Okabe

Producer: Tatsuhiko Okabe
Production area: Asakura City, Fukuoka Prefecture
Main products: Green onions, wild mustard greens, wasabi greens, bonito greens, pumpkins, etc.
No pesticides used
No fertilizer used

It all started with seed collecting as a hobby

My name is Okabe and I am from Asakura City, Fukuoka Prefecture.

Every year, my family harvests seeds from nearly 40 different kinds of vegetables. It started out as just a hobby, but then we started organic farming and before we knew it, we had become pure growers.

I am very happy that the vegetables I harvested from my seeds will be available on everyone's dinner tables through Purely. Thank you very much.

It would be more accurate to say that vegetable seeds are "picked" rather than "picked."

As I grow vegetables, beautiful and sturdy vegetables appear. It's as if the vegetables are offering themselves to me as representatives every year, asking me to "collect their seeds." I can feel that silent pressure deep in my heart.

"Vitality" brought out by seed collection and soil preparation

It is very important to harvest seeds in fields where the soil is cultivated for natural cultivation in order to bring out the vitality of the vegetables. This is an important process in which the vegetables change over the generations to ones that do not depend on fertilizer. Recently, I have noticed some changes in the constitution of my vegetables.

This year, the vegetables that I had thinned out connected between the rows and started to grow vigorously, and I was surprised at their strong vitality. But I realized that this is how they should be. I realized that natural cultivation is about reviving the power of the soil to nurture life and the vitality of local vegetables that should be inherent in them.

I want to revive vegetables not just as objects, but as living things, together with my friends in our local area and throughout Japan. I want to create a world where this is the norm, where everything is embraced with goodwill.

According to Tatsuhiko Okabe