Jordan et al. (2026): Enhanced rock weathering for improved smallholder farmer welfare: An at-scale case study for rice agriculture in India
Jacob S Jordan, Tom MD Mills, Jonah Bernstein-Schalet, Rashmi Dikshit, Anikendra Das, Dilip Patidar, Robin Marlar Rajendran, Nilesh Kumar, Fiona Alder, Michael T Thorpe, Shantanu Agarwal, Laurence Y Yeung, Indra Sekhar Sen, Noah J Planavsky, David J Beerling, IN: CDRXiv
Smallholder farmers produce approximately one-third of the world’s food supply, but face persistent challenges from soil degradation, limited access to affordable inputs and growing climate variability. The authors utilize enhanced rock weathering (ERW) as a pathway to address these constraints while generating durable carbon dioxide removal (CDR). Commercial-scale deployments by Mati Carbon during the 2024 summer monsoon rice growing season in Chhattisgarh, India applied basalt on over 2,000 acres (810 ha) farmed by more than 600 smallholders.