Story: Kia Fariborz Photos: Agriculture and Food Cluster/GIZ Thailand
Bangkok and Chainat – What does it take to shift millions of smallholder rice farmers towards climate-smart practices – and who finances the transition? That question brought a high-level delegation of officials from the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) of India to Thailand in May 2026, for a hands-on technical exchange visit hosted by GIZ Thailand under the BMZ-Carbon Offsetting Rice Project and The Thai Rice: Strengthening Climate-Smart Rice Farming (Thai Rice GCF) project funded by Green Climate Fund (GCF). The visit is part of a broader collaboration between GIZ India, GIZ Thailand and NABARD to assess and design a regional scaling project on sustainable and climate-resilient rice value chains – efforts for which Thailand’s experience offers some of the most instructive lessons available.
Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives (BAAC) / Credit: Agriculture and Food Cluster
Thailand’s blueprint for climate-smart rice
Rice is at the heart of India’s food security. With around 150 million tons produced annually from nearly 47 million hectares, India accounts for roughly 28% of global rice output. But the sector carries a heavy environmental cost: irrigated rice systems consume up to 45% of the country’s irrigation water, while intensive fertilizer use is degrading soil health across major rice-growing states.
India’s policy environment is shifting. Climate finance, carbon markets and low-emissions agriculture are now firmly on the national agenda – and institutions like NABARD are being called upon to develop the financial architecture to support this transition.
Thailand has been navigating precisely these challenges for years. The Thai Rice GCF project implemented by the Thai government in cooperation with GIZ and International Rice Research Institute – globally, the largest climate finance project exclusively dedicated to rice – has successfully combined public finance, private sector participation, and national financial institutions to drive adoption of climate-smart practices at scale. Central to this model is Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives (BAAC), which has developed a suite of green finance instruments, climate-smart loans and risk management products specifically designed for smallholder farmers.
Three days, three dimensions
The three-day programme in Bangkok and Chainat province was structured to give the Indian delegation a full picture of Thailand’s approach, covering all levels, from national policy to field implementation.
Day one opened with a visit to BAAC headquarters in Bangkok, where participants engaged directly with the bank’s teams on climate-smart loan products and incentive structures that have successfully encouraged farmer uptake. NABARD officials also presented their own transformative finance models for agriculture and rural development, setting the stage for a genuine two-way exchange. The day continued at the Department of Climate Change and Environment at the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, where discussions focused on Thailand’s role as a GCF National Designated Authority and the policy frameworks enabling national climate finance systems.
The second day took the delegation out of Bangkok and into the rice fields of Chainat province. At the Learning Center for Agricultural Production Enhancement in Sankhaburi district, participants met rice farmer and innovator Mr Boonyarit Homchan. His showcase of smart-tube technology for Alternate Wetting and Drying (AWD) offered a compelling demonstration of how low-cost, field-proven solutions could reduce both water use and methane emissions – without adding complexity or cost for smallholder farmers.
Mr Boonyarit said: “The introduction of AWD has resulted in visible water savings on my farm while maintaining rice yields. It has helped me use water more efficiently and reduce production costs.”
The visit to the local BAAC branch office in Chainat concluded the day, illustrating how national-level green finance products translate into rural lending operations – a critical link that often determines whether farmers can actually access climate finance.
Day three brought the delegation to AgriTechnica Asia & Hortex 2026 at BITEC Bangkok, one of Asia’s leading trade fairs for agricultural technology and innovation. Mr Sanjeev Rohilla, Chief General Manager of the Department of Climate Action and Sustainability of NABARD and Dr V B Shankar Adimulam, Chief General Manager of the Farm Sector Development Department of NABARD, joined the technical expert stage as a panellist alongside colleagues from BAAC, Rabobank and GIZ in a session on agricultural finance for climate-smart farming.
The programme concluded with a dedicated session on the Thai Rice GCF project, providing the Indian delegation with a detailed understanding of how the project was structured, financed and operationalised.
Connecting the dots: Finance, carbon and scale
A recurring theme throughout the visit was the challenge – and the possibility – of linking climate finance with carbon market mechanisms and robust monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) systems. Thailand’s experience demonstrates that these pieces can be made to work together: Emissions reductions can be measured, validated and progressively positioned for market-based mechanisms, creating additional revenue streams that reinforce farmers’ incentives.
This exchange visit was organized under the Climate Adaptation, Resilience and Climate Finance II (CAFRI II) project and the Carbon Offsetting Rice Emissions (CORE) project implemented on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). It took place in close collaboration with the Thai Rice GCF project under the develoPPP programme. ■
