The world will be watching India as the conference of parties to the Stockholm Convention meet in Geneva from April 25 to 29 to discuss, among other things, a global ban on the pesticide endosulfan. India was the only member country to take a stand against the ban at the Sixth Meeting of the Persistent Organic Pollutants Review Committee to the Convention that recommended the ban last year. Domestic opposition to India's...

India's rural innovators have proved that ordinary people are indeed capable of extraordinary inventions. Despite many constraints -- lack of education and severe cash crunch -- most of them have succeeded in using technology cost-effectively to build ingenious products. A washing-cum-exercise machine, hand operated water lifting device, portable smokeless stove, automatic food making machine, solar mosquito killer, shock proof converter, a floating toilet soap are few of the products on display...

Trade unions of all hues join forces in an unprecedented manner and present a charter of demands to the government. IN a rare show of unity, and for the first time since Independence, around one lakh workers affiliated to eight central trade unions and national industrial federations, including the Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC) and the trade unions of the Left parties, came out on the streets of New...

A shift from the traditional rice-wheat cycle and linking farmers directly to the market can end the current stagnation in farm sector, according to the Economic Survey 2010-11 tabled in the Parliament on Friday.The survey stated that capital investment were required not only for farm productivity but also to create adequate infrastructure for transport, storage and distribution of agricultural produce. The stagnation is evident from the fact that whereas overall GDP...

To many, ecology clearances coming in quick succession first for the 12-million-tonne steel project, including a captive power complex and a minor port that the South Korean Posco is diligently pursuing for close to six years and then for SAIL’s three mining leases at Chiria in Jharkhand appear as history bending revolutions. This is because the ministry of environment and forests, led by environment zealot Jairam Ramesh was till the...