-The Hindu Business Line The number of animals-in-milk rose to 80.52m, says 19th Livestock Census (2012) There was an overall decline of 3.33 per cent in the total livestock population in the country, according to the 19th Livestock Census (2012), compared to the 2007 census. In 2012, the total livestock population, consisting of buffaloes, sheep, goats, pigs, horses and ponies, mules, donkeys, camels, mithun and yak, stood at 512.05 million in 2012 against...

-The Business Standard States drag feet on even extended deadline for implementation; with Centre also worried on fiscal deficit, extension likely The National Food Security Act (NFSA) is still getting a lukewarm response from a majority of States. An extended deadline for implementing the law will expire in about a month and the Centre would have to give more time. Barring the nine States and two Union Territories (UTs) which introduced a food...

-Down to Earth Tells States to keep big contractors out of nutrition programme for children, and pregnant and lactating women The Supreme Court on Monday directed two BJP-ruled States, Gujarat and Rajasthan, to start decentralised procurement of rations for the child nutrition programme, Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS). ICDS, which was started in 1975 and is now a part of the National Food Security Act, provides for supplementary nutrition for all children from...

-LSE Asia Research Centre Background: Farmers' suicides have become an important socio-economic concern in India that has profound implication on the quality of life of farmers and their families. There are not many epidemiological studies on this. We propose to estimate suicide rates for farmers and non-farmers across the States of India and over time. We will also contextualise our results to the discourse on agricultural technology and development in general...

-The Indian Express Rajasthan government's decision to ‘target' free medicines and diagnostics is contrary to the recommended role of government in healthcare. In 2002-03, Abhijit Banerjee, Angus Deaton and Esther Duflo studied health facilities in rural Udaipur, Rajasthan. They found that facilities were poor and absenteeism was rampant. In 2013, we decided to revisit the same public health facilities. The motivation was to study two bold initiatives of the then Ashok Gehlot...