Global hunger is rising rapidly due to sharp spikes in food commodity prices. The combination of global food crisis and economic recession pushed the number of hungry people beyond the one billion mark, United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation's Director-General Jacques Diouf told the 36th session of the Inter-governmental Committee on World Food Security (CFS) in Rome on Wednesday. The session has been timed with the World Food Day on Saturday. Agricultural scientist...
More »SEARCH RESULT
What India’s Growth story conceals by Abhijit Patnaik
India’s performance at the Commonwealth Games in 2010 has been its best so far – second on the medals list.However, another kind of ‘competition’ ranked 84 countries in accordance with achievements in a different field this week. India was a lowly 67th. The field was hunger, measured by combining the proportion of people undernourished, the proportion of underweight children and the child mortality rate. The Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2010 –...
More »Despite economic Growth, India still a top home for childhood hunger by Katy Daigle
India, a global breadbasket with economic Growth that rivals China's, is still home to 42 per cent of the world's underweight children. The stark statistic, released by the Washington-based Food Policy Institute ahead of World Food Day on Saturday, stands in contrast to the country's burgeoning economy and hopes of boosting its global stature as exemplified by its hosting of this year's Commonwealth Games. "We need to be asking ourselves, what or...
More »Losing their nerve? by Jean Dreze
Five years ago, when the proposed National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) was a subject of fierce controversy, Bunker Roy compared the attitude of the government to that of a dog who crosses a road half-way, can’t decide whether to go forward or backward, and gets run over. This enlightening image applies again today, in the context of the proposed National Food Security Act (NFSA). The National Advisory Council (NAC) discussed...
More »Punjab Dy CM requests RBI Governor to promote debt swap scheme for farmers
The Punjab Government Thursday requested the Reserve Bank of India that it should impress upon Public Sector banks to aggressively promote Agricultural Debt Swap scheme to free the farmers from the clutches of moneylenders. The Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Mr. Sukhbir Singh Badal raised this issue when Dr. D. Subbarao, Governor, RBI today called on him. The Deputy Chief Minister impressed upon the Governor that the Punjab farmers reeling under Rs....
More »