-The Telegraph Amplifying the capacity of mangroves as bio-shields against extreme events possibly helped Bengal tap into MGNREGA funds Within weeks of the Indian Ocean tsunami on December 26, 2004, I was watching video clips of the event at the Choto Mollakhali market in the Gosaba block of South 24 Parganas. One message that came through these video clips was that fewer lives were lost where there was coastal vegetation. This positively...

-Livemint.com An uneven distribution of rainfall has left several key rice-producing states parched even as others had to battle excess water The patchy progress of the southwest monsoon this year has cast a long shadow on India’s kharif crop produce, particularly of rice, which is an important constituent of the government’s food distribution programmes. The threat comes right after wheat production in the rabi season took a hit from heatwaves and at...

-IndiaToday.in From Assam to Odisha and in many other states, floods were a natural phenomenon. But we turned them into monsoon mayhem by squeezing our rivers. Here is why we must rethink our response to this annual crisis. Every monsoon, lakhs of people in Indian states such as Bihar, Assam, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal are affected by floods when rivers swell and spread their waters amid pounding rain. Hundreds of men,...

-The Hindu Business Line Lack of data and monitoring on cropping patterns and water use has given irrigation schemes a bad name Long before the British Raj, India was a pioneer in canal irrigation by building dams across rivers. After Independence, considering the importance of canal irrigation, the Central and State governments have been giving increased thrust to its development. Today, India is one of the countries with the largest number of...

-The Hindu Business Line Rate hike due to lower acreage, fear of crop damage Urad dal prices in the retail market have increased on an average by Rs.3-5/kg in the past one week while at some places the surge is Rs.13/kg to about Rs.110-120/kg, mainly due to overall lower acreage and fear of crop damage after incessant rains in the growing region of Madhya Pradesh. Kendriya Bhandar, a Central government-run cooperative, has...