-GaonConnection.com The Indian government is considering ‘mandatory’ food fortification in the country. Several health experts have written to FSSAI calling the decision ‘a blanket approach’ to meet the complexity of malnutrition in the country. Details here. At least 170 people and organisations, including medical experts and nutritionists, have today, on August 2, written a letter to Ashok Kumar Mishra, the assistant director of Food Fortification Resource Centre, department that regulates food under...

The pandemic's first wave had a devastating impact on the livelihoods of rural workers in Bihar (including the self-employed) last year, according to a survey based research, jointly done by economists from Centre for Development Economics and Sustainability at Monash University, Australia and the New Delhi-based Institute for Human Development. A recent press note issued by the authors of the study shows that almost 94.4 percent of the households participating...

-Newsclick.in Individuals and organisations sent a letter to FSSAI saying that the chemical fortification of food is not a solution as nutrients do not work in isolation but need each other for optimal absorption. The Indian government’s plans to make mandatory the artificial fortification of certain food items has raised concerns as 170 individuals and organisations on Saturday wrote to the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) urging it to...

-The Hindu Business Line Scientists, farmer groups urge FSSAI Hyderabad: Several scientists and non-governmental organisations have asked the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) to scrap its plans to make synthetic or chemical fortification of foods mandatory. “A major problem with the chemical fortification of foods, said the letter, is that nutrients don’t work in isolation but need each other for optimal absorption,” they said in a letter to the Food...

-Down to Earth Never seen a drought of this magnitude, claim farmers; paddy crop affected Climate change is real. Droughts in the rainy state of Assam are not unheard of anymore. Warmer temperatures have affected the state’s tea gardens for a decade. Now, places recently experiencing unexpected and longer dry spells are catching the eye.  “Never before have I seen drought in this region,” said Dipantor Soh, a 28-year-old farmer from Mirigaon, a...