Rice is a staple food for billions of people, yet its cultivation is also a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. With a three-year project in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, BENEO is working together with Rikolto and CarbonFarm to promote climate-resilient rice farming aligned with the Sustainable Rice Platform (SRP) Standard. By combining farmer training, digital monitoring tools and guaranteed market access, the initiative aims to reduce methane emissions, strengthen farmer livelihoods and scale sustainable rice supply chains for food and pet food ingredients.
In 2025, BENEO launched an ambitious three-year project with international non-governmental organisation, Rikolto, and climate technology company, CarbonFarm. Funded by the Government of Flanders, it aims at promoting sustainable rice production in Vietnam. By December, the first volumes of sustainably grown rice were harvested in the Mekong Delta– making it the right moment to take a closer look at the project.
In this article, we explore:
- Why rice cultivation plays a key role in climate mitigation
- How the Sustainable Rice Platform (SRP) supports more resilient rice farming
- What BENEO’s partnership with Rikolto and CarbonFarm aims to achieve in Vietnam
- How farmer training and digital monitoring help reduce emissions
- What the first SRP-certified rice harvest means for customers and supply chains
Rice cultivation as important lever for more sustainable agrifood systems
Rice is a staple food in billions of households across the globe. However, intensive rice production practices – designed to meet global demand – have led to growing environmental challenges that directly threaten the sector’s long-term viability. These include inefficient water use, excessive fertiliser and pesticide application, and the widespread burning of rice straw after harvest. Together, they contribute to soil degradation, declining biodiversity, and substantial greenhouse gas emissions. Methane from flooded rice paddies is especially concerning, as global rice cultivation contributes approximately 10% of human-made methane emissions.[i]
The Sustainable Rice Platform as a global framework
This is why in 2011 the Sustainable Rice Platform (SRP) was launched, a global alliance dedicated to transforming the rice sector by improving livelihoods, reducing the environmental footprint of rice farming, and ensuring a sustainable supply chain. Since its launch, SRP has worked to empower farmers, promote climate resilience, and catalyse public-private action for sustainable rice production.
©Sustainable Rice Platform
Peter McAllister, SRP Executive Director, explains: “Global demand for verified sustainable rice continues to grow. SRP-verified production is now covering more than 80,000 hectares and is available across Asia, Europe, and the Americas.In Vietnam, SRP is already working with partners to develop and verify sustainable rice production. This recognizes the country’s role as a major export-oriented origin that presents a clear opportunity for growth. Through SRP’s verification and continuous improvement framework, BENEO is helping accelerate the growth of verified supply chains with credible sustainability claims supporting long-term supply resilience.”
Why Vietnam’s rice sector must adapt
Vietnam’s Mekong Delta faces severe climate risks such as floodings and land subsidence. As climate change intensifies and global buyers increase scrutiny of sustainability practices, Vietnam’s rice sector must adapt through more resilient, environmentally responsible approaches. For the nation, sustainable rice production is not only vital to preserve export competitiveness but also to ensure domestic food security and rural livelihoods over the long term.
Why sustainable rice farming matters
- High water consumption in flooded paddies
- Methane emissions from anaerobic soils
- Overuse of fertilisers and plant protection products
- Burning of rice straw after harvest
Joining forces to leverage individual expertise
In 2025, BENEO joined forces with Rikolto and CarbonFarm in a three-year project. Funded by the Government of Flanders, it aims to promote sustainable rice production in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta. The initiative is designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, improve soil health, and support farmers in adopting climate-resilient practices aligned with the Sustainable Rice Platform (SRP) Standard.
Rikolto leads farmer engagement and training, leveraging its deep experience with agricultural cooperatives. CarbonFarm contributes climate-tech tools, using satellite imagery and AI to monitor methane emissions, water usage, and field-level practices. This enables transparent tracking of sustainability performance.
BENEO’s production site in Wijgmaal, Belgium, will process at least 10,000 tonnes of the SRP-certified rice. The rice will be turned into high-quality starch, flour and protein ingredients for the food and pet food industries. By developing the market for SRP-certified rice ingredients, an innovative value chain model is being scaled up, connecting small-scale farmers to markets, and creating additional incentives for cultivating sustainable rice. After all, the trained farmers are granted guaranteed purchase quantities for their sustainably cultivated rice.
Building resilient rice supply chains together
The project helps farmers meet international sustainability benchmarks, strengthening Vietnam’s positioning as a trusted supplier of SRP-certified rice. It also equips cooperatives to support farmers in scaling sustainable production. At the same time, successful business cases will be documented to inspire wider adoption of sustainable practices.
The initiative contributes to BENEO’s sustainability strategy, the ‘Healthy Planet Plan’, and reflects its commitment to promoting sustainable agriculture, supporting farmers, and providing environmentally and socially responsible solutions to the market.
Watch this short video for a summary of the project:
Trainings for famers at the heart of the initiative
The partnership is farmer-focused at its core, with trainings conducted for at least 1,000 farmers in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta. Rikolto leads local implementation, working directly with rice cooperatives to train farmers. They also receive hands-on learning through demonstration fields, making it easier to adopt new practices with confidence. First training sessions were kicked off in May of 2025.
Nguyen Tuan Anh, Rice Project Manager, Rikolto in Vietnam shares his insights: “Through training sessions on the application of the Sustainable Rice Platform (SRP) Standard for farmers, Rikolto aims to support farmers in strengthening their capacity for more sustainable and efficient rice cultivation. In addition to technical training, Rikolto also works closely with the cooperatives to support the preparation of required documentation for third-party SRP certification.
The training focuses on effective water management, balanced and appropriate use of fertilizers, and the responsible application of plant protection products. These practices help reduce production costs and greenhouse gas emissions, while safeguarding the environment and farmers’ health”.
©Rikolto
What farmers experience on the ground
Initial feedback from a participating farmer sounds promising: “Since applying the SRP Standard, our production inputs have been reduced. Previously, we needed about 30 kg of seed per crop, but now only 25 kg is sufficient. At the same time, we have cut down on fertilisers and pesticides. My household’s rice yield in this year’s autumn–winter crop reached around 5 tons, an increase of more than 500 kg compared to the previous summer–autumn crop. Over the past few years, I have participated in several SRP training courses of Rikolto and found them very effective, so I apply these practices every season,” said Lam Thanh Nhung, farmer, Tan Binh Cooperative in Vietnam.
How the project supports farmers
- Practical SRP training via cooperatives
- Demonstration fields for hands-on learning
- Reduced input costs through optimised practices
- Guaranteed purchase volumes for SRP-certified rice
Evaluating environmental impact with digital tools
©CarbonFarm
When it comes to sustainable farming projects, reliable evaluation is key to draw conclusions that help farmers choose the best measures – safeguarding the sustainable success of the initiative. Innovative technologies such as satellites and digital logbooks are central to the three-year project. They enable the monitoring of farming practices and the scientific measurement of key outcomes. CarbonFarm’s satellite monitoring system tracks key environmental indicators. Among them are methane emissions from rice paddies and water usage. Overall, the data provides a reliable, consistent, and objective basis for evaluation. As a result, costly field inspections are no longer required. In addition, near real-time, verifiable insights into the environmental footprint of rice cultivation become available. This information is essential for assessing the impact of climate-smart interventions.
Vassily Carantino, CEO of CarbonFarm, explains: “Our technology brings full transparency on farming practices, GHG emissions, and water usage. It enables value-chain players to easily establish robust baselines, transparently track their progress toward reducing their scope-3 emissions, and gain access to carbon certificates that create business value. We are proud to partner with Rikolto and BENEO on this initiative, and we hope it will serve as a model for other value-chain players interested in regenerative agriculture.”
Digital tools used in the project
- Satellite imagery to monitor rice paddies
- AI-based assessment of emissions and water use
- Digital logbooks for farming practices
- Transparent data for scope-3 emission tracking
What’s next: First harvest of sustainably grown rice
In December 2025, the project reached its next big milestone. At that point, the first sustainably grown and SRP-certified rice was harvested in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta. Across the participating farms, 80 hectares were harvested. The harvest yielded 500 tons of paddy rice.
What this means for customers
• Access to SRP-certified rice ingredients with verified sustainability credentials
• Support scope-3 emission reduction efforts through transparent, data-based monitoring
• Strengthen supply chain resilience by working directly with trained farmer cooperatives
• Respond to growing customer and regulatory expectations around responsible sourcing
For customers, this means reliable, high-quality rice ingredients that support sustainability ambitions – without compromising on functionality or performance.
Now, BENEO’s colleagues in our production site in Wijgmaal, Belgium, are eagerly waiting for the milled rice to arrive via barge – so they can start processing it into high quality rice protein, flour and starch ingredients for food and pet food products.
Roland Vanhoegarden, Operations Managing Director for Specialty Rice Ingredients at BENEO comments: “Throughout the project, we aim to process around 10,000 tonnes of SRP-certified rice. We are excited about starting with the first volumes now. This initiative clearly demonstrates BENEO’s dedication to climate mitigation actions, sustainability and its proactive approach to addressing global challenges through innovative solutions. We are proud to leverage BENEO’s longstanding expertise in producing and marketing functional ingredients in collaboration with our project partners and Vietnamese farmers to reduce the environmental impact of rice production.”
At BENEO’s Wijgmaal site, the joint rice farming project is the next step in a series of sustainability initiatives. Between 2023 and 2024, BENEO supported local rice farmers in Laos by providing harvesting and threshing machinery. In doing so, working conditions improved for more than a hundred small-scale farmers each year. Alongside these efforts, BENEO installed a large-scale industrial heat pump at its rice ingredient plant in 2024. This technology enables the recovery of energy from waste water and helps reduce CO₂ emissions.
How the financial support from the Government of Flanders enables the project
The success of the project in Vietnam relies not only on the expertise of the three partners, but also on secure funding. Supported through the International Climate Action Programme of the Government of Flanders, the project was selected as one of seven demonstration projects out of 26 proposals for 2024.
An expert jury chose the initiative for its relevance in addressing pressing climate issues, environmental challenges and global sustainability. This financial backing enables the project to scale quickly, build local capacity, and demonstrate real-world climate impact through innovative partnerships.
The subsidy is used to cover the costs of training farmer cooperatives, monitoring and validating reductions in emissions and water consumption, as well as the separate logistics and processing of the final SRP-verified rice.
A big thank you goes to all partners for the trustful and open collaboration and their insights shared for this article. To keep up to date with the project, visit our website. If you are interested in learning more about BENEO’s sustainability strategy, click here.
Key takeaways
Rice cultivation accounts for around 10% of human-made methane emissions, making climate-smart practices essential.
BENEO, Rikolto and CarbonFarm launched a three-year SRP-aligned project in Vietnam in 2025.
This sustainable rice farming project in Vietnam combines farmer training, satellite monitoring and market development.
First milestone reached in December 2025 with the harvest of 500 tonnes of SRP-certified paddy rice.
The project supports BENEO’s Healthy Planet Plan and contributes to resilient, transparent rice supply chains.
[i] https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/story/rice-may-be-cheap-production-comes-cost
