Ziro Valley’s Apatani paddy fields seek UNESCO recognition

The Apatani people of the Ziro valley cultivate rice in a system so precise it has been compared to engineering: terraced fields, a community water-sharing code, and finger-planting that allows three crops a year.

The fields, which also rear fish among the paddy, are now on India’s tentative list for UNESCO’s cultural landscape designation.

Recognition would bring tourists and funding — and a new set of pressures. ‘We want the world to see us,’ a village elder said, ‘without the world remaking us.’