Why MRV is the missing link for low‑emission rice in Southeast Asia 

• Scaling of low-emission rice practices cannot rely on pilot-based project funding alone; public investment is needed to sustain adoption and crowd in private financial sources. 

• Attracting climate finance for rice-based methane mitigation practices in Southeast Asia is hampered by high costs of Measurement, Reporting, and Verification (MRV) systems.  

• Various digital platforms and technologies offer potential for making MRV cost-efficient and more affordable. 

• To unlock climate finance, countries need clear national roadmaps that establish enabling policies, strengthen institutional coordination, and prioritize domestic capacity building in support of robust national MRV systems. 

By Tobiah Gonzalez and Glenn Concepcion

Rice is more than a daily staple for over half of humanity; it is also a cornerstone of culture and a primary driver of national economies. However, the cultivation of this crop also carries a significant climate cost, as it accounts for approximately 10% of global methane emissions, with more than a third originating in Southeast Asia. Climate-smart agricultural practices to reduce emissions while maintaining production already exist (e.g. alternate wetting and drying); however, awareness, adoption, and sustained scale‑up remain limited. 

While scientific evidence supports a shift toward emission reducing practices, rice farmers are typically risk‑averse and already operate with their own proven “blueprint” for a successful harvest—one built around established practices, known cost structures, and irrigation arrangements. In this context, changing production behavior does not automatically appear to be an easy choice, particularly when the benefits of methane mitigation are not immediately visible at the farm level. As evidence from Southeast Asia shows, farmers require clear and tangible incentives to make this transition economically rational (Villanueva et al., 2025). Pilot projects are done to provide proof-of-concept, but to scale up and sustain participation—both from farmers and investors—these activities need to be linked to broader market mechanisms.  

Governments can bridge this gap by investing into the development of Measurement, Reporting, and Verification Systems (MRV). Under international climate cooperation frameworks such as the Paris Agreement, progress toward mitigation targets must be supported by national MRV systems. In practice, MRV is the system through which countries account for their emissions under national GHG Inventories and inform climate‑related fiscal decisions. These systems allow the conversion of emission reductions into assets that have value in the financial markets (e.g., carbon credits). Without functioning MRV systems, emission reductions—no matter how real at the field level—cannot be formally recognized, reported, or used to support NDC tracking, climate finance, or carbon market participation.  

In a new report and handbook published by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), researchers assessed the greenhouse gas inventory systems and MRV frameworks of three Southeast Asian nations, namely the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam. Designed to support capacity building for MRV in the three countries, the handbook makes the case that robust MRV systems are not a compliance burden, rather, an enabling infrastructure to attain climate goals. It gives an overview of the core MRV practices needed by countries and emerging technologies that can improve the MRV process. In the rice sector, MRV can translate adoption of climate smart practices into verifiable mitigation outcomes—potentially creating jobs, providing farmers with additional sources of income, and improving water management systems. 

Unlocking the “cost trap” 

MRV is a systematic process that builds the credibility of GHG mitigation projects. It provides the data needed for countries to meet Nationally Determined Contributions and allows for participation in cooperative frameworks such as Article 6 of the Paris Agreement and Voluntary Carbon Markets. 

Practices such as alternate wetting and drying (AWD), mid‑season drainage, direct‑seeded rice, improved straw management, and site‑specific nutrient management can reduce methane emissions substantially while maintaining yields and, in some cases, improving farm profitability. These practices are already embedded in national strategies and pilot programs across the region. 

However, some have also described MRV as a “cost trap”: the expense of monitoring small, fragmented farms often exceeds the revenue generated by selling carbon credits. For example, setting up an MRV system for a 3,060-hectare project in Vietnam can cost upwards of USD 325,000, with continuing annual operational costs of USD 55,000. MRV costs are often high relative to expected financial returns, making programs difficult to scale and unattractive to investors. Countries have historically relied on international financial institutions, such as the Green Climate Fund, to develop MRV systems and finance rice mitigation programs. The long‑term goal is to progressively engage the private sector through market‑based mechanisms (such as carbon markets, price premiums, and others) to finance the transition toward low emission rice practices. 

To attain this, the report discusses ways to reduce MRV costs, enhance efficiency, and improve data transparency to make rice mitigation projects more investable. This includes building MRV systems that connect project-level MRV with national accounting by establishing clear governing bodies and laws to regulate carbon markets. The handbook also highlights multiple technologies available that can lessen the cost of MRV such as remote sensing, digital data infrastructures, and leveraging artificial intelligence to streamline the validation and verification process. By strengthening their institutional capacity to implement and host MRV projects, a country can gain investor confidence and attract capital to finance its mitigation programs. 

Farmers at the center of MRV design 

MRV systems must work for farmers, not just governments. When participating in MRV, farmers have to learn and comply with minimum implementation requirements of chosen mitigation actions such as AWD. They have to consistently report their activities and bear with third-party audits. For this reason, project developers must strike a balance between keeping farmer engagement simple and ensuring robust data collection. 

Farmers will not go through these procedures unless they see clear and timely benefits. While MRV systems can link rice cultivation to various sources of finance, its effective provision of incentives determines whether farmers’ participation is sustained in the long-run. The common assumption is that farmers receive a meaningful share of profits from the sale of carbon credits. In practice, however, the average price for a carbon credit in the voluntary carbon market is approximately USD 7 USD per ton of CO2 equivalent (Ecosystem Marketplace, 2025), which is insufficient to cover both the operational and incentive costs of most mitigation programs. When these incentives fail to materialize, farmer interest declines and undermine long-term programs. Hence, incentives should be designed so that adoption is rewarded through multiple channels, rather than carbon revenue alone. More effective incentive packages combine the repurposing of fertilizer subsidies, cost-savings and productivity gains, access to machinery, advisory services, results‑based payments, premium markets for certified low‑emission rice, and new income streams from straw valorization and circular‑economy activities.  

This is where building robust MRV for the rice value chain becomes critical. Improving a country’s national MRV chain can facilitate higher prices of carbon credits, optimize operational costs, reduce legal uncertainties, and increase private sector investments towards mitigation programs. Countries need to move from fragmented pilot MRV systems to phased, national rice MRV strategies.  Immediate priorities include:  

1. National rice MRV roadmaps with clear institutional roles for agriculture, environment, irrigation, statistics, and finance agencies. Uncoordinated agencies risk overlapping responsibilities and parallel initiatives making MRV development inefficient. Data systems should be interoperable across agencies and levels of government. 

2. Establish enabling policies that provide clarity on carbon rights, benefit sharing, and use of mitigation outcomes. This also includes defining minimum dataset requirements for rice activity monitoring, quality assurance and quality control procedures, and linking project-level MRV with NDC reporting and article 6 frameworks. Legal institutions are also crucial to ensure that mitigation projects protect farmer interests, follow stakeholder consultation requirements, and prevent double counting. 

3. Prioritizing Tier 2 MRV as the operational baseline. More robust MRV reduces uncertainty, builds credibility, and increases the value of mitigation outcomes, making the process more rewarding. Tier 2 MRV also enables countries to identify realistic technical potential to implement mitigation programs and set achievable emission reduction targets.  

4. Governments need a phased approach to build domestic capacity. As the number of mitigation projects grows, building domestic human capital is needed to keep up with demand. This includes procuring in-house expertise in local governments for implementation of GHG inventories and solidifying government’s capacity to approve, validate, and issue carbon credits. Furthermore, developing a local or regional pool of accredited verifiers can reduce the cost of project-level verification. 

5. Finally, governments can link low‑emission rice products to markets by establishing certification schemes that add value, facilitate price premiums, and support viable farm business models for low-emission rice products. However, sustained demand for these products requires implementing the corresponding compliance‑based mandates for companies to reduce their carbon footprints. 

MRV is not merely about counting emissions—it is about establishing trust: between farmers and governments, and between countries and investors. It bridges the gap between climate ambition and the delivery of measurable, rewardable mitigation outcomes on the ground. 

When designed well, an MRV system becomes a strategic public good that strengthens policy credibility, unlocks finance, creates jobs and supports a resilient transition to low‑emission rice production across Southeast Asia. 

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Read the study: 

Acknowledgments:

The Accelerating Methane Reductions in Rice Production Systems through Market-based Mechanisms (AMR) project, funded by CCAC, aims to facilitate enabling conditions for changing producers’ and value chain actors’ perception and behavior towards climate-smart practices or low-emissions practices as not only an approach that is good for climate and environment but also the most economically practical option.

Methane Accelerator for Southeast Asia (MASEA) project evaluates investment opportunities and proposes policy options for promoting carbon mitigation in rice production in the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam. 

Additional resources: 

Villanueva, D., Labios, J. D., Pajadan, K., Cabrera, E., Malana, X., Revicoy, R., and Mirzabaev, A. (2025) 
Accelerating Methane Reductions in Rice Production Systems through Market-based Mechanisms: Results of Farmer Surveys and Choice Experiments in the Philippines  
Policy Brief. International Rice Research Institute, Los Baños, Philippines.  

Villanueva, D., Pajadan, K., Revicoy, R., De Castro, A., Malana, X., Gonzalez, T., Pascual, F.J., Nghia, T. D., Hai, L. T., and Mirzabaev, A. (2025). 
Accelerating Methane Reductions in Rice Production Systems through Market-based Mechanisms: Results of Farmer Surveys and Choice Experiments in Vietnam. International Rice Research Institute: Los Baños, Philippines. 215 p. 

Villanueva, Donald B., Karen M. Pajadan, Riela Rose R. Revicoy, Xyla Mae L. Malana, Allenie M. De Castro, Orachos Napasintuwong, Uchook Duangbootsee, Piyawong Punjatewakupt, and Alisher Mirzabaev (2025). 
Accelerating Methane Reductions in Rice Production Systems through Market-based Mechanisms: Results of Farmer Surveys and Choice Experiments in Thailand. 
Technical Report, 143 p. International Rice Research Institute, Los Baños, Philippines.