-The Business Standard How to fix the agricultural pricing mess The government's move to get the mandate of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP) reviewed afresh by an expert panel needs to be viewed in a broader perspective - one that weighs political populism against economic logic. It has been argued that minimum support prices (MSPs) have been raised often - and supposedly partly for political reasons - during the...

-Live Mint Exporting one's way out of the surplus is a losing proposition as global prices have fallen rapidly in the past few weeks India held 77.5 million tonnes (mt) of food stocks in its central pool on 1 May. These stocks had reached a record high of 82.4 mt on 1 June 2012, and that level could be crossed if wheat procurement this May is similar to the procurement a...

-The Indian Express The Congress's bill could end up sponsoring the NDA's campaigns A good thing about the logjam in Parliament, it has to be said, is that it has prevented the ill-advised food security bill from being passed. It would, though, be naive on our part to presume the BJP stalled Parliament - the Congress's blatant abuse of the CBI process was a big reason for this - only because it...

-The Hindustan Times Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has aptly described the persistence of mass undernutrition in India as a "national shame". What is even more shameful, however, is the passivity of the government - and of the country - towards this humanitarian emergency. The passivity begins with a reluctance to face the facts. The first step towards more effective nutrition policies in India is regular monitoring of the nutrition status of...

-The Hindu   The water markets of Marathwada are booming. In the town of Jalna alone, tanker owners transact between Rs.6 million and Rs.7.5 million in water sales each day Thirst is Marathwada's greatest crop this season. Forget sugarcane. Thirst, human and industrial, eclipses anything else. Those harvesting it reap tens of millions of rupees each day across the region. The van loads of dried-out cane you see on the roads could end...