OUR STORY

As someone who eats a lot of rice at home, I was shocked to learn that rice has the second highest emissions footprint of any food globally - only beef is worse. My curiosity led me to dive deeper into the reasons behind this, so I started learning about rice farming. I discovered that most rice is grown in a way that uses a huge amount of water and produces methane – a powerful ‘greenhouse’ gas.

But I also discovered that farmers and scientists had been working together for years to find a solution – a farming method that uses less water, produces less methane and is even higher yielding. Great news for the planet and great news for rice farmers.

I wanted to start buying sustainably farmed rice but I couldn’t find it anywhere in the UK. In fact none of the major brands were even talking about the emissions problem which really annoyed me. That’s when I decided to look into it further.

I went to Haryana state in northern India and over three days I met the farmers and researchers who are pioneering sustainable rice farming in the region. The researchers explained how they collect data from the farms to monitor emissions and other environmental metrics. And the results were clear – on average the farmers had reduced their emissions by 49%.

Meanwhile the farmers, (like Sushil, pictured) all proudly shared the same experience with me: by following the sustainable farming techniques they had improved their yields by an average of 10%. And their rice was amazing! They take incredible care of their crops and grow a heritage variety of Basmati that was better than anything I’d tasted before.

Through these conversations, and seeing the different farming techniques myself, it was clear that sustainable rice farming was already having a hugely positive impact. I left India determined to make this sustainably farmed rice available in the UK.

(And by the way, if you’ve tried our rice there’s a good chance it came from Sushil’s farm.)

We secured a major listing with WAITROSE as our very first customer in June 2023…. talk about jumping in the deep end. Thankfully Waitrose shoppers are loving our rice and the recognition hasn’t stopped there—NICE RICE went on to Great Taste Awards for both our dry and cooked rice, and gold in The Grocer's New Product & Packaging Awards 2023.