-The Indian Express The result in the Kairana Lok Sabha seat bypoll, where ganna payment was the main issue, brought forth a crisis born of advances in plant breeding and boost in sugarcane production. Not many would have heard of Bakshi Ram. Currently director of the Sugarcane Breeding Institute (SBI) at Coimbatore, he isn’t as well-known as Norman Borlaug or M S Swaminathan. Yet, the wonder sugarcane variety, Co-0238, bred by...

-The Tribune Will open sale counters in villages, near highways Kurukshetra: Farmer unions across the country have decided to suspend supply of vegetables and milk to wholesale markets from June 1 to 10. Growers from Haryana will join the ‘Kisan Avkash’ as well. Famers are demanding price fixation policies for agricultural and horticultural produce, loan waiver and implementation of Swaminathan Commission recommendations. Gurnam Singh Charuni, state president of the Bhartiya Kisan Union, said farmers...

-The Indian Express In a letter to PM Modi, Swadeshi Jagran Manch, the economic wing of the RSS, had alleged that advocacy groups of dubious antecedents and an official in the Health Ministry were “lobbying for the use of vaccines such as HPV vaccine. New Delhi: As allegations of “MNC vaccine lobby” and “vested interests” pushing their agenda in India refuse to die down, World Health Organization (WHO) Deputy Director General...

-Livemint.com The historic farmer protest launched on 1 June 2017 had a nationwide impact and raised several demands of farmers which still remain unaddressed Mumbai: The Akhil Bharatiya Kisan Sabha, a farmers’ organization affiliated to the Communist Party of India (Marxist), or CPM, will launch yet another protest on farm issues from 1 June to mark the first anniversary of the Maharashtra farmer protests. The Maharashtra state council of Akhil Bharatiya Kisan Sabha...

-Frontline.in The government ought to have specified its definition of cost of crop production in the Budget to prevent any confusion in the minds of people on minimum support prices. Speaking at the Krishi Unnati Mela 2018, Prime Minister Narendra Modi reportedly complained that confusion was being spread about the announcement on minimum support prices (MSPs) made in the Finance Minister’s 2018 Budget speech. The speech had assured farmers that they would,...