Mechanized Direct Seeded Rice & Fertilizer Deep Placement for Vietnam’s Low-Emission Rice
By integrating precision direct-seeding machinery with supportive national policy and cooperative training, IRRI and Vietnamese partners scaled a low-emission rice production package that dramatically reduced input costs, lowered emissions, and boosted farmer profits across Vietnam.
For generations, rice farmers in Vietnam’s Mekong River Delta relied on wasteful broadcast seeding, high chemical inputs, and manual labor. Today, climate change and rising production costs are driving a rapid shift toward sustainable agriculture. At the center of this transformation is an innovative technical package developed by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) that combines Mechanized Direct Seeded Rice with Fertilizer Deep Placement (mDSR-FDP). By deploying advanced dynamic air-assisted seeders, this integrated system accurately places seeds just 1 to 2 millimeters below the soil surface while simultaneously depositing fertilizer 3 to 4 centimeters deep. This precision placement dramatically improves nutrient uptake, enhances root health, and reduces crop lodging, offering a high-productivity, low-emission solution for sustainable rice farming.
To build an enabling environment for regional scaling, IRRI aligned its strategy with the Vietnamese government’s flagship program for One Million Hectares of High-Quality, Low-Emission Rice by 2030. To overcome high equipment costs and technical knowledge gaps, IRRI collaborated with agricultural cooperatives, machinery manufacturers, and local government agencies. By utilizing cooperative networks, smallholders were able to share the capital and operational expenses of specialized machinery. Extensive field demonstrations, large-scale baseline surveys, and training programs were conducted to demonstrate the technology's economic and environmental viability. Crucially, IRRI supported the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment in drafting official technical guidelines, culminating in the formal national certification of mDSR-FDP as a recognized technical advance.
The institutional recognition enabled rapid expansion across diverse agro-ecological zones. Pilot models established across eight provinces in the Mekong River Delta demonstrated striking results, cutting seeding rates by up to 65 percent, reducing nitrogen fertilizer use by up to 43 percent, and lowering pesticide applications. Combined with yield increases of up to 15 percent, overall input costs dropped significantly, driving net profits up by 26 to 79 percent for participating cooperatives. Building on this success, IRRI expanded the initiative to the Red River Delta in northern Vietnam, where pilot sites in Hai Phong, Ninh Binh, and Hung Yen achieved dramatic profit surges compared to conventional cultivation methods.
Through June 2026, hundreds of local farmers have completed intensive technical training, actively transitioning high-level national policy into field-level practice. By successfully integrating precision machinery, policy reform, and multi-stakeholder partnerships, IRRI and its partners have established a scalable, market-driven blueprint for climate-resilient agriculture and sustainable rural livelihoods across Vietnam.
Read the full Enabling Environment Success Story here.
Compiled by the CGIAR Scaling for Impact (S4I) program, the “Enabling Environment Success and Failure Stories” is a collection of accounts that chronicles both the successful and unsuccessful efforts in creating a supportive environment for scaling agrifood system innovations. Through compelling narratives that highlight specific challenges, key players, and outcomes, this series is designed to demonstrate how CGIAR actively influences and strengthens these environments to achieve a wider, more impactful reach.