Challenges and opportunities in soil carbon trading promoted to reduced greenhouse gas emissions and climate change mitigation: A perspective

Abstract

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (UNIPCC 2007) held that it is important for agriculture sector to adapt to such climate changes particularly for food and water security. Paris Agreement was adopted by India in 2015 which aimed to strengthen international cooperation in climate action and provided for creation of global carbon market to mitigate climate change impacts. The Ministry of Forest, Environment and Climate Change Government of India framed programs, policies and regulations to address the climate change threats and mitigation strategies. The Government of India and FAO took an initiative on transforming Rice-Wheat system with regenerative practices. The Ministry of Agriculture and Farmer Welfare (2023) prepared draft green credit program implementation rules under which the National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture (NMSA) was included as one of the nine missions outlined under National Action Plan on Climate Change. The soil carbon trading is now carried out under NMSA. Punjab and Haryana are central to India’s rice-wheat production system, vital for national food security and agricultural exports. However, this intensive system faces increasing stress due to groundwater depletion, stubble burning, soil degradation, and climate vulnerability. Agriculture practices account for about 20% India’s total emission and majority of which comes from crop residue burning or agriculture biomass burning. Soil carbon credit and trading for climate change gradually emerged as a prominent tool to reduce green house emissions. This attracted the attention of several companies dealing with soil carbon trading based on elimination of residue burning but incorporation in soil to increase tradable soil carbon. The paper highlights the experience of monitoring and evaluation of a soil carbon credit project based on direct sown rice in Punjab and Haryana by a US based team and encapsulate salient results of a comprehensive review of literature on challenges and opportunities in soil carbon trading.