-Capital Market 14 Crore Soil Health Cards to be Issued in Three Years; Credit Support of Rs. 8 Lakh Crore to Agriculture During 2014-15 Targeted "Finance to 5 lakh joint farming groups of Bhoomi Heen Kisan through NABARD in the current financial year", said Shri Radha Mohan Singh, Agriculture Minister, while inaugurating the National Rabi Conference. Minister said that, a very large number of landless farmers are unable to provide land title...

-Deccan Chronicle Hyderabad: Organic products now cost 15 to 35 per cent more than other products as supply is not being distributed uniformly. Storage cost too is high and certification for growing these products, per acre costs Rs 50,000. Farmers are now demanding government support for a resource system. According to experts, there are currently two major reasons why organic products are expensive. The distribution of production is not uniform. For instance,...

-The Statesman Prime Minister Narendra Modi has expressed anguish over suicides by farmers, whose condition has not improved despite the high rate of economic growth. The reason for this distressing state of affairs is that economic policies are badly crafted. The primary effort of the Government has been to increase agricultural production. The price factor is not taken into consideration, the perception being that the farmer will be better off...

-Economic and Political Weekly   The emphasis on use of digital technologies to bridge the "rural-urban gap" in the union budget is limited to high talk and minimal allocations. The need for a more comprehensive and peoples' participation-oriented rural action plan should have been the focus while setting sectoral allocations, but that is not to be in this mid-year budget. Vipul Mudgal (vipulmudgal@gmail.com) heads the Inclusive Media for Change project at the Centre...

-The Telegraph Tura: The Meghalaya government is working out modalities to declare horticulture and agriculture yields as "organic certified". Farmers are being encouraged in organic production and the government is assisting in the certification process. Director of the horticulture department Daniel Ingty told The Telegraph, "Nearly 90 per cent farms in Meghalaya are organic by tradition. However, these are yet to be certified. The government has embarked an ambitious programme on mission organic...