Bokashi 101 Updated

Bokashi is a Japanese word for "fermented organic matter". This process uses EM’s (Effective Micro-Organisms) to ferment a large range of organic materials, such as grains, animal manures and vegetable materials, to produce different varieties of bokashi for different applications.

The bokashi used in a Bokashi Systems typically uses barley, wheat or a bran & rice mixture that is then fermented with our beneficial microbes and molasses. This material has a moderate nutrient value on its own, but is also teeming with billions of Effective Micro-Organisms that immediately go to work when in come in to contact with organic material, such as the food scraps in your bokashi system, or the organic matter within your soil.

These Micro-Organisms work in an anaerobic environment or in plain language without Oxygen that is how the work without producing heat or any offensive odors, there is no leachate problem, and it does not attract insects or rodents either.

Fermentation is a process of treating organic waste which uses anaerobic microbes, rather than aerobic microbes. It is similar to the pickling process - a pickle for example still looks like a cucumber, although the color and inside it has changed completely.

The pros of this process including reduced greenhouse gas emission, a more nutritious end-product, and it is easier to manage.

A comparison of the two processes is as follows:

Composting                                Bokashi Fermenting

Can produce foul odors           Sweet-smelling, or odorless
Can attract rodents                   No rodents or vermin
Can attract insects                    No Insects or flies
including flies                             Produces no heat, 
Produces heat                           all energy retained
Requires mechanical                Done in-vessel and
and labor input                           requires no turning
Produces significant amounts Produces minimal greenhouse
of greenhouse gases                Biomass is reduced by approx 50%
Biomass is reduced by            Takes about 4 weeks to produce
less than 10%                            Is stable and storable immediately
Takes up to 6 months to           All nutrients, organic material
produce.                                    and microbes retained.
Is unstable and reactive           Leachate is re-used,
until complete                            all nutrients retained.
Many nutrients and organic     Some products are not
material are lost in                    recommended for composting
heating process.                       but ANY organic material
Wastes leachate which can     can be fermented.
become an environmental
hazard.

 UPDATE: All food scraps must be cut into small pieces and compressed so no air is present, the system will work much faster and you will get much better results!.