Abstract: Asingan, Pangasinan, Philippines, is known for its annual celebration of the rice-based “Kankanen” festival, which relies heavily on local rice production. Since rice production is one of the major sources of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, this study will guide the farmers and policymakers in developing sustainable farming practices and mitigating the impacts of GHG emissions. The main goal of this study is to quantify the CO2 emissions from the organic, combined, and conventional farming methods in the municipality, considering seasonal variations and irrigation methods using life cycle assessment. The agricultural inputs were obtained from the agriculturists of the municipality. The system boundary was set from cradle to gate, and kg of CO2 emission per hectare of land was used as the functional unit. The results show that conventional farming consistently shows the highest emissions among the three farming methods. On the other hand, irrigated systems produced higher emissions than the rainfed irrigation method. To reduce GHG emissions, farmers should adopt organic farming with a more water-efficient irrigation system, and policymakers should strongly recommend supporting this.

Keywords: life cycle assessment, organic farming, conventional farming, greenhouse gas, rice cultivation, emission factor

Pages: 451-464