-The Indian Express For governments both at the Centre and in the concerned states, the most sensible option is to act fast. After two years of relatively good rains, large parts of Maharashtra (especially the Marathwada region and the adjoining districts of Jalgaon, Nashik, Ahmednagar, Sholapur, Amravati and Yavatmal), North Gujarat, Saurashtra, Kutch and North Karnataka are reeling under drought. What is different this time is that it has been induced...

-The Hindu Business Line Many regions saw rain deficits; Maharashtra, Karnataka have already declared a drought New Delhi: Even though many States have declared a drought-like situation in some pockets of their respective territories, agricultural input companies are putting up a brave fight saying the situation is not all that bad and hoping it would have little impact on their bottomlines. While the Met department, in its end-of-season report, said the country as...

-Newsclick.in Of the 136 talukas in Maharashtra, which had demanded that they should be declared ‘drought-hit’, only three were “eligible” to be there in the category, as per 2016 manual. Though the India Meteorological Department (IMD) had declared a month ago that as many as 255 districts of the country have witnessed deficit rainfall of 20 to 59 per cent during the South-West monsoon, many of the states are yet to declare...

-Financial Express Milk is the largest crop in India in terms of value—at `6.5 lakh crore, it’s more than the total value of paddy and wheat put together At the recently concluded annual session of the International Dairy Federation’s World Dairy Summit in the scenic city of Daejeon in South Korea, India was the toast of the world. From a largely captive market—despite being the world’s largest milk producer—the country is emerging...

-Livemint.com The production of ‘mahua’ is finally entering the formal economy as new initiatives seek to upscale this indigenous drink, selling it across the country and even the globe It is a cloudy morning in Nangur village in Bastar district, Chattisgarh. It is a settlement of a little over 400 families, considered fairly large in these parts. We make a bumpy journey down a narrow, unpaved road intermittently shaded by sargi (sal)...