Mitti Labs secures $3m seed round to combat methane emissions in rice farming

By Agroempresario.com

Mitti Labs, a startup dedicated to reducing methane emissions in rice farming, has secured $3 million in a seed round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, Voyager Ventures, Overview, and angel investors. The company recently launched five projects across 30,000 hectares in India, with ten more in the pipeline. They collaborate with the Syngenta Foundation and Tilda rice maker Ebro Foods to train farmers in techniques that can reduce water use by 30% and methane emissions by 50%.

Using AI models trained on ground data and remote sensing, Mitti Labs measures these reductions to generate carbon credits. The firm partners with Cornell University, the International Rice Research Institute, and the USDA on methane abatement and measurement technologies. Co-founder Xavier Laguarta explains, "This season is the first where we officially onboarded farmers into our carbon programs, and the first batch of credits should be issued around July, August 2025."

Rice accounts for over 8% of anthropogenic methane emissions, primarily from flooded fields that promote methane-producing bacteria. Mitti Labs employs strategies like direct seeded rice (DSR) and alternate wetting and drying (AWD) to tackle these emissions. Laguarta notes, "There's no silver bullet; it’s a menu of options. Different approaches work better in different regions."

DSR involves planting seeds directly into rice fields, which reduces the need for continuous flooding, while AWD allows fields to dry periodically, reducing methane emissions. Mitti Labs also promotes a no-burn strategy for post-harvest biomass, which requires a business model to collect and process the biomass instead of burning it.

Despite the operational challenges, Laguarta sees a clear return on investment for farmers. "DSR can deliver cost benefits in reduced cultivation time, water, and labor costs, while AWD offers significant environmental benefits." Mitti Labs has 120 field agents working with thousands of farmers, providing education, hand-holding, and training.

For methane mitigation to be viable, carbon markets must play a role. Laguarta says, "We need to reliably quantify methane emission reductions to generate credible carbon credits. This involves leveraging satellite imagery, remote sensing, and ground truth measurements."

Mitti Labs collaborates with Gold Standard and may work with Verra, which is releasing a new methodology for rice methane reductions. Laguarta emphasizes the importance of high-quality projects: "We want to prove that our projects have real impacts on the ground."

Despite challenges in the voluntary carbon market, Laguarta remains optimistic. "Even if farmers revert to old practices after a few years, the methane reduction during the mitigation period is still significant." Investors are also attracted to Mitti Labs' technology, which can be applied to other projects, offering a scalable solution to methane emissions in rice farming.