The new rabi grain pricing policy seems to have been influenced more by macro-concerns about food inflation management rather than any considerations relating to food production planning. The marginal increase in minimum support prices (MSPs) of most rabi crops, barring pulses, is understandable given the government’s focus on inflation reduction and the fact that this marginal increase comes on top of earlier hikes of a decent magnitude. Moreover, there are...

The case of the Food Security Bill gets curiouser and curiouser.  What started off as a fight between universalization and targeting has ended (or so it would seem) in a complete victory in the National Advisory Council, Government of India (NAC) for targeting through universalization (if such a thing was possible), with the honourable exception of Prof Jean Dreze, who has to be commended for his ‘note of disagreement’. On...

The National Advisory Council (NAC), led by Congress president Sonia Gandhi, may have suggested doubling food subsidies to keep an electoral promise, but the country’s food and agriculture minister, Sharad Pawar, is not amused. Pawar has expressed frustration at the NAC’s suggestion to provide subsidised food to 75% of the population. “It (the NAC proposal) reminds me of an old AICC (All Indian Congress Committee) resolution when I was a young...

While the National Advisory Council (NAC), Planning Commission and the Prime Minister Office are grappling over the proposed National Food Security Bill, the government has been steadily increasing allocation under the Targetted Public Distribution System (TPDS) during last many years. According to Siraj Hussain, chairman and managing director, Food Corporation of India (FCI), with the rise in procurement of wheat and rice by the corporation during last few years, more and...

Vice-President M Hamid Ansari today said it is "anomalous" that over 250 million Indians were chronically undernourished although the nation has achieved self-sufficiency in foodgrain production. "This is anomalous looking at record food grain production in recent years," Ansari said quoting Food and Agriculture Organisation reports while delivering the convocation address at the Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology (OUAT) here. Stating that the country has achieved self sufficiency in food grain...