-The Hindu Grains and vegetables are being grown with the technique used for paddy farming BERHAMPUR: System for Rice Intensification (SRI), a technique of paddy cultivation, is being successfully used for cultivation of other crops including vegetables by small farmers in Ganjam district of Odisha. Typically, the SRI is used for paddy cultivation to increase yield. But for the past few years the same technique is being used to increase the harvest of...

-The Financial Express The Narendra Modi government has pledged to employ all machinery at its disposal to deal with a second straight year of deficient monsoon. The Narendra Modi government has pledged to employ all machinery at its disposal to deal with a second straight year of deficient monsoon and denied an impending distress in the vulnerable pockets of the country, but a dispassionate look at the ground situation would show there...

-Deccan Herald Poor monsoon forcing govt to intensify implementation Notwithstanding the scathing attack on UPA’s schemes, the Modi government would fall back on the previous regime’s flagship programme to rescue the rural economy from second consecutive deficient monsoon. The government would intensify implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) in drought hit areas to stop the slide in rural incomes. Officials revealed that the main thrust in MGNREGA implementation in drought affected...

-Outlook Pulses are falling off the poor man’s plate. Price rise may hit the middle class next. Pulses—all-important as a source of protein—are set to be spoilers this year in the government’s endeavour to keep a check on food inflation. Already, over the last nine months, the prices of some pulses have jumped 64 per cent in major cities. This is because of below-normal monsoon last year, compounded by untimely rain and...

-DNA Govt gears up to ring-fence farmers, prices from poor rains India's farm sector shrank for the first time in five years in the year ended March 31, Union agriculture minister Radha MoHAn Singh said on Wednesday, a day after the government forecast a likely drought this year that could hit output again. The Met office cut this year's monsoon forecast on an El Nino weather pattern that has raised fears of...