Emissions reduction is only sustainable when farmers see the benefits

Technical protocols must reach the farmer

According to Hoang Van Hong, Deputy Director of the National Agricultural Extension Center, the low-emission crop production program cannot stop at developing technical protocols for individual crops, those protocols must actually reach farmers on the ground.

"The key is that technical procedures must be simple enough for farmers to apply in practice, while still meeting international requirements for measuring and verifying emissions reductions," he said. What matters most to farmers, he emphasized, is that the protocol helps them farm more effectively. How much emissions are reduced and how they are measured is the responsibility of the technical and management system, not the farmer.

He also cautioned that if the MRV framework, covering measurement, reporting, and verification of emissions, is too complex, it will be difficult to scale, particularly for crops other than rice where internationally accepted standard models are not yet widely available.

Within the program's mandate, the agricultural extension system will organize training from the provincial down to the commune level, followed by direct instruction for farmers. Hong committed to working with enterprises to develop inputs and technologies suited to low-emission production, including short-duration seed varieties, slow-release fertilizers, and electrically powered mechanization equipment.

For the transition to succeed and hold over time, Hong proposed that enterprises, technical staff, and farmers participate together within a unified system, rather than treating low-emission production as the isolated responsibility of individual localities or standalone projects.

Removing bottlenecks in inputs, mechanization, and processing

Tran Thanh Hiep, Deputy Director of the An Giang Department of Agriculture and Environment, expressed his hope that results from the low-emission crop production program become visible quickly, so that farmers can see the economic benefits clearly and commit to the program over the long haul.

An Giang has registered more than 350,000 hectares under the One Million Hectares of High-Quality, Low-Emission Rice program and regards it as an essential path toward restructuring rice production sustainably. However, Hiep acknowledged that key bottlenecks remain, most notably the fact that low-emission rice has not yet created a clear and recognizable price premium over conventionally produced rice. "Farmers will only get on board when they see real results. If the benefits are unclear, sustaining the program long-term will be very difficult," he said.

He called for accelerating the development of a "low-emission agricultural produce" label and growing area codes for low-emission rice, to create tangible added value and give farmers a genuine incentive to participate. Beyond changing cultivation practices, the transition also requires resolving a cluster of related challenges: agricultural input supply, technical infrastructure, mechanization, deep processing, and market linkage.

With this in mind, An Giang is orienting toward a collective economic model based on joint purchasing and joint selling, replacing the fragmented individual production of the past. This approach is seen as the practical mechanism for reorganizing production and building supply chains at the scale needed to meet low-emission targets.

Promising models, but financial viability still unproven

The transition to low-emission agriculture in Vietnam is a long road that requires mobilizing resources well beyond the state budget, according to Do Thi Huong of the Global Green Growth Institute. Private capital, climate technology, and green finance models are therefore essential to accelerating the process.

"Many low-emission models show promise, but if they cannot demonstrate financial and market viability, they will be difficult to implement and scale," she assessed, adding that beyond emissions reduction targets, selected projects must be commercially viable and capable of attracting investment.

GGGI is currently supporting a pilot calculation model for low-emission rice cultivation that combines alternate wetting and drying irrigation with biochar-based fertilizers, applying Digital MRV technology to quantify emission reductions and calculate the model's actual costs.

The organization has mobilized more than 400 million USD for green investment projects in Vietnam, including more than 300 million USD supported through green bond issuance. It is also running a program to help climate technology companies and agricultural startups connect with investors, access technical advisory support, and raise international capital.