Every passing day makes it clear that the proposed food security law may not come by for a while. One report quoting the Planning Commission even suggested that it can be expected only in 2012. This Twelfth Plan (2012-17) launch has support from the concerned dual Ministry of Agriculture as well as Food, Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution. In that eventuality it does mean a surge in food insecurity.A dispassionate...

While the revolutionary National Rural Employment Guarantee scheme has brought higher wages for labourers across the country, farmers and landlords in Tamil Nadu have begun to feel the pinch following its huge success. They don't get labourers to work in their fields due to low wages. Will the new choice force landlords to hike wages? Rural Tamil Nadu is witnessing a critical migration of labour. Farm workers, 80% of who...

A lot has been said and written about the visit of Barack Obama, the President of USA to India. The corporate media was in the usual over-enthusiastic drive to bring to its readers and viewers all minute details about his visit from where he stayed and what he ate to how many warships, planes and cars accompanied him and how a whopping $200 million was spent per day for the...

West Bengal's farmers switched to new scientific material called 'Poly Mulching' (made out of plastic) to protect crops. The North Bengal region has got some highly fertile agricultural land. But weeds, lack of proper sunlight, heavy downpour, soil erosion, seed germination and cold weather conditions often result in harming the crops and ultimately curtailing agricultural production. However, to protect crops from such problems, farmers have now found a suitable way by using...

The poster boy of microfinance is now seeking some anonymity. In Andhra Pradesh, the epicentre of the worst crisis faced by microfinance in India, SKS Microfinance is playing down its identity and going into preservation mode. At its modest office in a residential colony in Warangal district, India’s largest microfinance company has taken down its board. At its head office in upmarket Begumpet in Hyderabad, it hung a cloth mesh...