-The Guardian GDP may be an inaccurate indicator in sub-Saharan Africa, which is a concern for those who want to use statistics to help the world's poorest people Even in good financial times, development aid budgets are hardly overflowing. Government leaders and donors must make hard decisions about where to focus their limited resources. How do you decide which countries should get low-cost loans or cheaper vaccines, and which can afford to...

-Down to Earth The country's 76 million poor have been denied the right to claim subsidised Foodgrain under public distribution system The government has denied 76 million people in the country eligible to access public distribution system (PDS) the benefits of the Food security system. For the past 20 years, the government has not cared to refresh its data and has been distributing Foodgrain according to the population figure of 1991. Worse, the...

-The Economic Times Arvind Panagariya, a professor of Indian economics at Columbia University, hits out at Nobel laureate and Harvard University professor Amartya Sen over his call to confront MPs with the "number of deaths" a delayed Food Security Bill can cause. The former chief economist at the Asian Development Bank counters Sen's argument that it is high social spending that has contributed to the economic growth of Asian economies such...

-Live Mint The kharif crop may improve by 8.1% to 135 million tonnes, after falling by 2% last year due to weak monsoon Foodgrain production in India's kharif season, the summer crop, is estimated to increase by a little more than 8% this year on expectations of normal monsoon rains, boosting hopes of a recovery in Asia's third largest economy and a decline in Food price inflation. The kharif crop may improve by...

-Live Mint Some commentators dismiss the seriousness of India's nutritional crisis as it fails to account for genetic differences With one in two children malnourished in India, child malnutrition is considered to be among the biggest challenges facing the country. But are these figures highly exaggerated? The answer is a resounding yes, according to Columbia University economist Arvind Panagariya, who believes that the international standards used to measure nutritional attainments of...