Bengal is staring at the possibility of losing self-sufficiency in rice unless the state manages to reverse a declining trend and step up production by as much as 12 per cent over the next four years. Lack of self-sufficiency in grain production need not necessarily be an alarming factor for a modern economy. But such a status is looming over Bengal in spite of factories not mushrooming on farmland — the...

Social protection has seen a sharp focus in the development policy agenda during the past decade. There is also a clear trend for making social protection, as well as food security, “rights-based”, rather than “discretionary”. Yet, no clear consensus has so far emerged concerning many basic design choices and implementation modalities. The Food Security Act 2011, which is now under the consideration of our parliament, is designed to achieve the...

Science and technology hold the key to developing low-input, high-output agriculture. The challenge is to use new technologies creatively and to make evidence-based decisions on the deployment of new technologies. Crop breeding is carried out to meet two broad objectives: one, to increase yields of a crop per se and, two, to protect the yield potential by developing crops resistant to diseases, pests and environmental extremes.  Both yield-enhancement and yield-stabilisation are...

A delay in the onset of monsoon by 3-4 days over the Kerala coast won’t jeopardise India’s farm prospects in the crop year starting June 1 as sowing usually picks up with the arrival of the seasonal showers, according to outgoing agriculture secretary P K Basu. In an interview, Basu told FE that the rainfall in June, however, holds the key. ‘‘If there are scanty showers in June, sowing may be...

-IANS West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Friday conceded that there were 'debt-ridden peasants who contemplated committing suicides'. 'There are many farmers who take loans from money lenders at high interest and when they are unable to repay the money, they contemplate suicide. Do not give up life like that, life is most valuable,' said Banerjee, after giving Kisan Credit Cards to farmers here in the South 24-Parganas district, about 150 km...