Is drought being used as an excuse to delay the national Food Security Act? An informal network of organizations and individuals involved in the Right to Food Campaign believe so. The campaign groups are demanding that a national consultative process on an improved draft bill must be started immediately so that the proposed Food Security Act could be passed as soon as possible. The campaigners also demand that exports of...

In the 1990s, Ahmed Khan’s company in Bangalore, India, churned out hundreds of thousands of plastic bags and other packaging material each month that eventually ended up as garbage. Now, he is in the business of scouring the city’s landfills and trash cans to reclaim some of that waste and pave the way to a more environmentally friendly enterprise. Mr. Khan, 60, is trying to solve two of the biggest...

One billion hungry people, the largest such cluster in history, are depending on another one billion to donate small amounts of cash to find food. The World Food Programme, facing a funding shortfall with donor governments hit by the financial crisis, has issued its first direct appeal to one billion individuals to stump up what they can to help others beat hunger. Josette Sheeran, head of the UN food aid...

When the Indian government met the largest economic crisis the world has faced in nearly 80 years with tax cuts, aid for rural workers and interest rate cuts, critics said it was not enough. Now, though, it looks as if the policy makers may have offered too much. India’s $1 trillion economy, largely insulated from the global crisis by low reliance on exports and a heavily regulated banking system, has exceeded expectations...

The fourth edition of the World Economic Forum’s (WEF’s) Gender Gap Report, released on October 27, makes for somewhat depressing reading if you are Indian. The country has slipped four places in 2009 to rank 114 out of 134 countries. If there is slight consolation, it is that our biggest global economic competitor, China, fared slightly better, slipping two places over its 2008 ranking. Beyond that, comparisons appear meaningless. At...