Effective Microorganisms aka EM, or efficient microbes, are a cluster of beneficial organisms - developed by Dr. Teruo Higa, a horticultural professor at U of Ryukus, Japan - which ferment organic matter in an anti-oxidative way.
The essential basic technology of EM is a consortium of five or more species of microorganisms, from across at least three classes of organisms, in a synergistic culture (called a consortium) which produces lactic acid under anaerobic fermentation and which also produces an environment (in the liquid or plant matter under fermentation, etc.) which is highly antioxidative and regenerative, or syntropic (aka anti-entropic) and which contains numerous powerful antioxidants, largely produced by phototrophic anaerobic bacteria known as purple non-sulfur bacteria (PNSB).
EM technology has now become a major science, assisting in the creation of sustainable practices for agriculture, human health and hygiene, animal husbandry, nature farming, environmental stewardship, disaster relief, construction, industrial, community activities and more.
EM has found useful applications in the following areas, and likely many more:
- agriculture: for conditioning soil, compost and plant wastes. Continued use of EM can convert a soil to a truly sustainable type of soil, called a zymogenic soil
• agriculture: for feeding livestock, for waste treatment, for odor control and pest management (e.g., flies);
• manages odors, improves feed utilization, improves health and vitality
• agriculture: for treating or controlling various fungal diseases or pests of plants
• lawn maintenance: for treating soil and compost or organic fertilizers, for preventing fusarium and molds
• buildings and architecture: to maintain healthy buildings and building materials (lumber, concrete, plaster, etc.), to prevent "sick building syndrome" and extend life of materials
• as a deodorizer for barns, waste treatment areas, homes, etc.
• as an aerosol spray deodorizer for home, agricultural and industrial use
• household: pets, odor control, treating pet wastes on floors, for shower stalls, kitchen sinks, dishpans, garbage pails, toilets, drains, sinks, sink drains, compost buckets, etc.
• human and animal use: ingestion of a wide range of antioxidative and regenerative products made from EM, as a healthful probiotic and antioxidant supplement
• waste treatment
• wastewater treatment
• septic waste treatment
• for remediation of polluted or unbalanced waterways, streams, bays, ponds and lakes
• toxic waste remediation
• preparation of waste biomass material for bio-conversion into fuels such as biodiesel and others
These beneficial phototrophic microorganisms are also used to make EM ceramics, bokashi, EM-X ceramics, EM salt, antiox brews, fermented antioxidant brews and many more products.
I would like to tag this page with a request for more scientific proof and rigour of the claims being made.
- your wish is granted --Brunov25 19:53, 7 February 2013 (PST)
- the last link in the list is not a scientific proof. It might be considered useful information, but it appears to be written by people with an interest in promoting the system. Joeturner 02:13, 8 February 2013 (PST)
- I created a separate section for Intellectual Property claims --Brunov25 20:21, 8 February 2013 (PST)
- Joeturner added "There is no scientific consensus on the value of EM. Linda Chalker-Scott recently did a brief analysis of published journals and concluded that there were few articles examining the process in the peer-reviewed journals, and of those that were in the best journals, no effect was seen when using Bokashi as an agricultural amendment." However, since you already asked me to create a science section, i have added your link to the existing scientific references section. Thanks, Joe. Both you and her are apparently only interested in (disproving) the soil improvement aspect of the claims. I like your scientific spirit :-) --Brunov25 20:20, 8 February 2013 (PST)
- I have replaced the controversy section and suggest you look at Appropedia:Rigor before removing it again. My link was not intended to be a scientific proof, but a line to acknowledge that there is controversy about the value of EM. That deserves to stay and not be relegated to a link, in my opinion. I'd ask you to retract your claim that I am "apparently only interested in (disproving) the soil improvement aspect of the claims", I did not make the claims stated in this page, I am not needing to prove or disprove anything. I am simply saying that it is right to point out that controversial subjects are controversial. I am not trying to disprove EM, I have no direct experience of it, nor any way to prove or disprove it as a system. However, I do know good science when I see it and can tell you for sure that there are very few scientific papers on the subject compared to similar technologies, such as composting. Joeturner 00:43, 11 February 2013 (PST)
- Joe: you add value when you include new information about EM in this page. The Chalker-Scott literature review link adds value. Your opinion that her link makes the topic controversial doesn't add value: first because that is not what her paper concludes and second because you are really stretching the definition of controversial. Your assertion that you know "good science" better than I is contrary to the spirit of science (which seeks to free itself from argument by self-proclaimed authority) and does not add value to the users of this wiki. On the other hand, your last statement about the number of papers about EM compared to composting might be of some value if you can provide some proof of that (as simple as the comparative number of hits on key search engines) --Brunov25 11:59, 11 February 2013 (PST)
With reference to the content, I think it would be better as a subsection of the bokati page. Joeturner 13:07, 7 February 2013 (PST)
- It's definitely a notable topic - I'd encourage expansion rather than merging. --Chriswaterguy 18:06, 7 February 2013 (PST)
- Since Bokashi can be made with the help of various collections of friendly microbes, such as the one trademarked "EM" (Effective Microorganisms), and that EM (and other collections of friendly microbes) have a wide variety of other uses besides boksahi making, I think each one needs its own page in which each needs to reference the other at some point. --Brunov25 19:23, 7 February 2013 (PST)
OK fair enough. I will come back and add papers which dispute the effectiveness of this as a system in due course. Thanks. Joeturner 00:27, 8 February 2013 (PST)
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