The amount of rural reportage in the Indian media remains far too low, with even important stories such as those on farmer suicides tending to be ignored. One of the outspoken critics of this trend has been P Sainath, rural-affairs editor of The Hindu  and 2007 winner of the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism, Literature and Creative Communication Arts. He was also the journalist who originally broke the story on...

The farmers need to come out of their traditional mindset and develop business acumen to reap the benefits of food processing that has a lot to offer to the country, says joint secretary, ministry of food processing industries, Government of India, Ajit Kumar. Kumar was in the city to inaugurate one-day orientation training programme on food processing for farmers at then Banaras Hindu University on Sunday. Saying that commercial orientation and awareness...

Want to invest in West Bengal? Try agriculture—that was the message from chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee to captains of industry at a CII National Council meeting here on Wednesday. At a roundtable with industry heads, including ITC chairman YC Deveshwar, Godrej Group chairman Adi Godrej and Pepsico India chairman Sanjeev Chadha, the Bengal chief minister shed his aggressive stance on industry, visible in the run-up to Singur, and said corporates...

Basmati paddy prices are expected to touch their highest level of Rs 3,400 per quintal during the forthcoming harvesting season, says a research report. The prices of traditional Basmati paddy are in the range of Rs 2,650—3,350 per quintal this month, and are expected to be Rs 2,500—3,200 per quintal in November. In December, however, they will go up to Rs 2,700—3,400 per quintal, depending on the varieties, the report said. The forecast...

Union Minister for Agriculture Sharad Pawar today expressed unhappiness over non-availing of agricultural  loan by the farmers of the North-Eastern States in the way it was expected, which he feels has hampered investment and finally the overall agricultural production of the region. "Though the Centre has doubled the agricultural credit amount recently and Centre has been able to disburse Rs 3, 50,000 crore this year, the North Eastern States have not...