The Snapshots in Time Collection

Rice Planters in a Flooded Paddy Field, Philippines, c. 1898-1900

Rice Planters in a Flooded Paddy Field, Philippines, c. 1898-1900

This photograph captures the labor-intensive process of rice transplanting in the Philippines around the turn of the twentieth century. Workers, shielded from the tropical sun by broad woven hats, stand in flooded paddy fields to hand-plant rice seedlings row by row -- a method of wet rice cultivation practiced for centuries and still central to Filipino agriculture and daily sustenance today. Project: 218494