-The Hindu An enriched soil has withstood the vagaries of monsoon and a depleting ground water table to provide an enviable sugarcane yield in a farm in Puliangudi of Tirunelveli district in Tamil Nadu. Sustained attention given to soil health using organic inputs has enabled V. Antonisamy reap 65 to 70 tonnes of sugarcane per acre in his farm. Explaining the methodology adopted to enhance soil quality, Mr. Antonisamy, who has been...

-Hindustan Times Mumbai: For a state considered the sugar bowl of the country and home to generations of politically heavyweight co-operative doyens, this is a sign of changing times. The drought-prone Solapur district in western Maharashtra, which has the highest number of sugar factories in the state (33), has finally decided to put a stop to cultivation of the water-guzzling sugarcane crop, with its collector saying the area under cultivation for the...

-The Hindu TIRUCH: A farmer of Erakudi in Uppliyapuram block has shown the way in increasing cultivation using greenhouse. She has been cultivating 1,000 square metre area under the greenhouse concept. N. Vijayasanthi, the farmer, had set up the greenhouse at an estimate of Rs.11 lakh which included a subsidy of Rs. 4.50 lakh. “It was a great opportunity for us in utilising the greenhouse concept with the cooperation of the Horticulture...

-IANS Washington: Groundwater is disappearing fast from the world and India is among the worst hit, shows data from NASA's Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites. Among the world's largest groundwater basins, the Indus Basin aquifer of India and Pakistan, which is a source of fresh water for millions of people, is the second-most overstressed with no natural replenishment to offset usage, said two new studies led by the University of...

-The Hindu Business Line Not the RBI, going by the revised priority sector lending norms, which will further reduce credit to the marginalised Prime Minister Narendra Modi has often expressed his sense of anguish at the plight of farmers. In a recent statement in the Lok Sabha, he noted that the agriculture community’s problems were “old, deep-rooted and widespread”, and stated that farmers cannot be left to fend for themselves. Implicit in that...