CarbonFarm Raises €7 Million to Scale Rice Methane Reduction and Digital MRV

CarbonFarm has raised €7 million in an oversubscribed Series A to expand its rice decarbonisation platform across Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America. The round was led by Colam Impact, with participation from Proparco, Suma Capital, elea, Working Capital Fund, Albo and BPI France, alongside returning investors Serena & makesense through Racine² and Techmind. The company plans to use the funding to expand its digital measurement, reporting and verification capabilities and support the development, financing and certification of rice decarbonisation projects.

CarbonFarm is targeting a sector with a substantial methane and water footprint. Rice cultivation accounts for around 12% of human-caused methane emissions and can use up to 28% of global freshwater resources, according to the company. Practices such as periodically draining fields rather than keeping them continuously flooded can cut emissions by up to 50% and reduce water use by up to 30% without reducing yields.

 

Rice Decarbonisation Depends on Measuring Thousands of Small Farms

 

The challenge is scale. Rice production is dominated by smallholders, often farming plots of around one hectare, so large programmes may involve tens of thousands of individual farmers. That makes verification difficult for companies and carbon buyers seeking evidence that farming practices have actually changed and that emissions reductions are real.

CarbonFarm addresses this through AI-based analysis of satellite imagery, field-data collection and greenhouse-gas modelling. The system is designed to track farming practices and quantify emissions at field level, creating evidence that can support carbon credits as well as Scope 3 claims within corporate food supply chains.

"Independent, field-level evidence is becoming the expectation," said James Hastwell, Co-Founder and CTO of CarbonFarm. "Projects that can show clearly how their results were scientifically measured build greater confidence and can attract buyers willing to pay a premium for high-quality credits."

 

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Local Partners Remain Central to Scaling Projects

 

CarbonFarm is not attempting to replace local organisations that already work with farming communities. Instead, it partners with producers, cooperatives, agribusinesses, NGOs, governments and project developers and adds project-development expertise, digital MRV, climate finance access and connections to carbon buyers.

"Scale will not come from replacing local value-chain players; it will come from equipping them," said Vassily Carantino, Co-Founder and CEO of CarbonFarm. "They understand the farming systems and have the relationships needed to make change happen."

The strategy reflects the practical limits of a purely technology-led approach. Measurement tools can improve credibility and lower monitoring costs, but farmer participation, training and implementation still depend heavily on organisations with trusted relationships on the ground.

 

Carbon Markets and Scope 3 Demand Are Expanding the Funding Base

 

Interest in rice projects is growing as methane reduction becomes a larger corporate climate priority and rice credits become compatible with more regulated carbon markets. CarbonFarm is also positioning its platform for companies seeking to reduce emissions within agricultural supply chains rather than relying solely on offset purchases.

The company already works with organisations including Mars Food, Diageo, Ebro, Tilda, BASF Agricultural Solutions, Livelihoods Funds, myclimate, the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, SNV, Helvetas, Action Against Hunger and Google. Since its previous funding round, it has expanded operations to 19 countries.

 

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Development Finance Is Moving Into Rice Decarbonisation

 

Proparco’s participation adds a development finance institution to the Series A investor group and reflects increasing interest in agricultural methane reduction as a climate finance opportunity. The model combines emissions reductions with potential benefits for water use, farm resilience and rural livelihoods.

"Rice decarbonisation is a highly promising climate-finance opportunity that is beginning to receive the attention it deserves," said Jean-Gabriel Dayre, Co-head Regenerative Agriculture, Carbon Markets and Naturetech at Proparco. "CarbonFarm has built a strong project-development portfolio and the capabilities needed to channel high-integrity climate finance towards rice-growing communities."

 

The Test Will Be Whether High-Integrity MRV Can Scale With Farmer Participation

 

CarbonFarm’s opportunity lies in making fragmented agricultural projects measurable enough to attract larger pools of corporate and climate finance. Its expansion across 19 countries gives it a wider operating base, but scaling further will depend on maintaining data quality while working across different farming systems, project developers and regulatory environments.

The €7 million Series A gives the company capital to strengthen both its technology and project-development capacity. The larger test is whether digital MRV can reduce the cost and complexity of proving emissions reductions sufficiently to make high-integrity rice decarbonisation viable across millions of small farms.

 

Source: CarbonFarm