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Through a case study on the commercial development of local rice varieties, the tinawon, produced by Ifugao communities of the Philippines, this article aims to examine agricultural models that emphasize the quality of local production rather than the food productivity with standardized quality, and to analyze their implementation, success, limitations and impact at the local level. The tinawon marketing project in Ifugao Province falls within a period of global economic, agricultural and environmental crisis. Issues related to rice production are numerous: food security, socioeconomic development, environmental conservation, as well as terraced landscape and local culture preservation. The dynamics of development and conservation sometimes come into contradiction at the local level. We show that the potential of local production to meet these socioeconomic and environmental issues must always be contextualized. The nature of the product, cultural and staple food for tinawon rice, the national agricultural policies promoting productivity and improved varieties in the Philippines, the local production models in which subsistence prevails in Ifugao Province, and the opening of producers to global market and capitalist system can be limiting factors. The success of such models cannot happen without bringing social, economic and technical innovation in the local system. But at what cost?