The Science - Bokashi Composting - page 18

alongtimeresearcherintheareaofsyntropicantioxidativemicrobesandEM,describestheprimary
species in EM as “dominant organisms, meaning that they can entrain and control other local en-
vironmental organisms, which are more passive and often open to entrainment”. 10 This is why you
shouldn't add a lot of already spoiled or moldy food into your bokashi bucket. The fermentation
process works on this domination principle, and if there are too many “bad” species of microbes
present at the beginning, the microbes in the EM bokashi bran may not be able to dominate and
control them unless you add large amounts of EM, either through liquid spray or extra EM bokashi
bran. It also explains why you should add more bokashi bran when you start detecting problems
with your bokashi bucket, or when you add harder-to-break-down items such as meats to it. More
EM bokashi bran means more good microbes, and more good microbes have a better chance of
dominating and entraining bad microbes. When the bad microbes are suppressed and controlled,
you will get what you are ultimately looking for: a fermented food waste that is alive with benefi-
cial microbes.
Vinny Pinto describes some of the ways that EM organisms are able to alter their environment
to discourage the growth of harmful microorganisms, such as:
• when in anaerobic fermentation, the EM organisms produce copious quantities of lactic acid and
smaller amounts of malic, acetic, propionic, and benzoic acids. These serve to lower the pH, of-
ten to below 4.0, which strongly discourages the growth of many so-called harmful organisms.
• manyoftheabove-namedacidsaremildlyantioxidative,andthisantioxidantactionwillalsodis-
courage the growth of many undesirable organisms.
• when in anaerobic fermentation, the EM organisms produce a number of anti-microbial sub-
stances which tend to destroy or discourage a number of undesirable organisms. 11
This information is echoed by EMRO, the EM Research Organization, which states that:
EM has the potential, given the conditions, to suppress the putrefactive microorganisms and
dominatethissphereandcreatesre-animatedsurroundings,thatis,organicsaretransformed
through the process of fermentation as opposed to putrefaction, and living organisms, as
well as inorganic materials, are enabled with the means to impede deterioration. 12
The ability of the microbes in the EM consortium to produce antioxidants and suppress patho-
gensarejustacoupleofthereasonsEMhasgainedalotofattention byresearchers. Let'snowtake
a look into EM and see what the individual microbes are that make the culture so special.
EM (effective microorganisms)
EM is primarily made up of three groups of microorganisms: lactic acid bacteria, photosynthetic
bacteria (also know as purple non-sulfur bacteria or PNSB), and yeasts. As previously discussed,
eachEMformulationmaycontainavarietyofspeciesfromeachofthegroups.EMmothercultures
may also contain lower concentrations of other microorganisms such as actinomycetes and fungi,
but the bulk of the microbes in the culture are the big three:
Lactic acid bacteria (LAB)