If you make a rice plant then you are doing rice cultivation, since you're making it from the seed to the harvest and doing it all!

This word uses a kun'yomi reading for 稲 (いな) and the usual on'yomi reading for 作. You may not be familiar with the いな reading yet, but it appears in a lot of compounds that use 稲, so it's good to know. Here's a mnemonic to help:

When you do rice cultivation, you should eat nachos (いな). You need all the calories and carbs from some loaded-up nachos to get ready for the hard work of rice cultivation, you know? Mmm, you'd happily do rice cultivation every day if it meant you could eat nachos.