Indonesia’s rice farmers test climate-friendly farming

Added: 2026-05-18

[00:00:00]Rice is a staple for billions, but growing it also contributes to climate change. Paddy fields release large amounts of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. Now, a breakthrough by a Singapore research institute could change that.

[00:00:14]So, trials for sustainable rice farming in Indonesia, India, and Lao show emissions can be cut by up to 50% while helping farmers boost their yields.

[00:00:25]CNA's Saiful Bahri Ismail reports from Central Java in Indonesia.

[00:00:30]Rice fields stretching as far as the eye can see.

[00:00:35]Central Java is one of Indonesia's largest rice producing provinces, consistently ranking among the top three.

[00:00:44]It's a critical rice bowl for the country, contributing more than 16% of national output.

[00:00:51]Kasno is a rice farmer in Jatirogo village in a Grobogan regency.

[00:00:57]The 55-year-old is among 172 farmers here taking part in Temasek Life Sciences Laboratories decarbonizing rice project.

[00:01:33]Farmers were provided with rice seeds, fertilizers, and pesticides for the trial. The first planting season began in September 2025 and wrapped up in February this year.

[00:01:47]The study covered nearly 100 hectares of rice fields using an integrated approach.

[00:01:54]We got around methane reduction of up to We have a three-pronged approach. One approach is that change the irrigation methodology like AWD which is alternate wetting and drying.

[00:02:06]And also we have our own fertilizer cocktail which we developed. A scientifically based and then nature driven fertilizer cocktail we have. We use that. And also we have varieties to test as well because genetics matter. So all these things put together the results were positive. And we could be increased the yield of the farmers by 6% even though it was flooding. Similar results were recorded in parallel trials in India and Laos.

[00:02:33]Rice is often grown in flooded fields in part because water helps suppress weeds.

[00:02:40]But flooding also cuts off oxygen in the soil. In this low oxygen environment microbes break down organic matter.

[00:02:49]A key byproduct of this process is methane.

[00:02:53]That methane can escape through the rice plant itself from the roots up to the stems and out into the atmosphere.

[00:03:02]Paddy rice cultivation is a major source of global methane emissions. Flooded fields account for about 12% of the total methane releases. Now that's about 60 million tons each year. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas about 27 times more powerful than carbon dioxide.

[00:03:22]Research into low methane rice began in laboratories in Singapore building on more than two decades of scientific work.

[00:03:31]The project also received an environmental award at the World Economic Forum last year.

[00:03:37]There is a body of science that's been developed that could be shared with other researchers so that it can be improved upon. Second, a network of partnerships of people who've learned to work together on hard problems across across borders. And third, uh perhaps a proof of concept that research um and scientific rigor uh is aligned to community benefits.

[00:04:02]A second season of large-scale trials is now underway with a final report expected by the end of the year.

[00:04:09]The next phase, uh scaling up adoption across Asia, is targeted to begin in 2027.

[00:04:17]Project partners aim to produce 50,000 tons of low-methane rice within 2 years.

[00:04:24]We have a very deep operational presence in Indonesia. We're already working with a lot of uh farmer networks across Java.

[00:04:34]We already have the farmers who are on-boarded with us and to whom we can scale. Just to give you a ballpark number, uh this season we are already will be doing around 16,000 hectares with the farmers on AWT technology itself. We can easily produce 50,000 tons uh low-carbon rice which can implement these technologies and can produce sustainable rice.

[00:05:00]The project is funded mainly by the Philanthropy Asia Alliance, a Singapore-based initiative by the Temasek Trust that supports collaborative efforts that tackle environmental, health, and social challenges across Asia.

[00:05:15]We want to make sure that the climate um friendly rice, less deleterious to the environment, will eventually be actually bought in supermarkets Indomaret or cold storage in Singapore um Mannings. And that really would be the proof of the pudding is in the eating.

[00:05:32]Will the price point be similar? Will it taste as good? And that's really the end game for all of us at the alliance.

[00:05:40]The decarbonizing rice project has a longer-term ambition to produce 1 million tons of sustainably grown rice by 2032.

[00:05:50]Its early success assures how turning science into practice can deliver real benefits for both farmers and the environment.

[00:05:59]Refining rice for a lower carbon future, one grain at a time.

[00:06:05]Satu Bari Smile, CNA, Grobogan, Indonesia.