IRRI, Tuesday, May 16, 2017

LOS BAÑOS, Philippines – Experts gathered at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in early May to design a training strategy to support smallholder adoption of sustainable best practices.

The Sustainable Rice Platform (SRP), an alliance of 70 stakeholder institutions convened by IRRI and UN Environment, will launch an assurance scheme targeting smallholders, based on the SRP Standard and Performance Indicators for Sustainable Rice Cultivation—the world’s first sustainability standard for rice.

Following the launch of the standard and performance indicators in October 2015, multi-country field pilots were implemented. Training needs have since grown and become more differentiated, necessitating a comprehensive, unified framework.

"The workshop involved 35 participants from SRP member organizations both in Asia and across the world. This first SRP Training Strategy Workshop exceeded expectations both in terms of member participation as well as progress in developing a common framework for a training curriculum,” said Peter Sprang, SRP's Technical Coordinator.

With the participation of GLOBALGAP, UTZ, and Control Union, the workshop also discussed the forthcoming revision of the SRP Standard and Performance Indicators, as well as a road map for the rollout of the SRP’s planned assurance program revision.

The SRP is the world’s first global sustainability standard for rice production. It was developed with expert input from IRRI and the UN Environment, along with more than 60 government agencies, private companies, NGOs, and research agencies.

The SRP aims to encourage 1 million smallholder farmers to adopt climate-smart sustainable best practices by 2021, as a contribution to the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

See: http://news.irri.org/2017/05/sustainable-rice-platform-plans.html