There’s both good news and bad news on the food front. The good news is that wheat, maize and pulses production during the current year will be the highest that India has seen. Wheat production was expected to be high, thanks to the twin advantages of a high procurement price —- higher than international prices —- and favourable weather conditions. But pulses production too has zoomed, because of the soaring prices in the...
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Burmese Rohingya refugees rescued in India's Andamans by Subir Bhaumik
More than 90 Rohingya refugees from Bangladesh have been rescued by police from a boat drifting in India's Andaman and Nicobar archipelago area. All of them were starving and seriously dehydrated, police said; 25 have been admitted to hospital. Doctors at the hospital said they had been on the high seas without food and water for more than a week. The migrants said they were set adrift in an engine-less boat on the...
More »Rising Food Prices May Not Signal New Crisis by Aprille Muscara
As food prices rose for the seventh month in a row in January, contributing to recent popular unrest in the Middle East and a spike in commodities purchases by developing countries last week, some analysts are quick to make comparisons to the dry years of 2007-2008. But others warn against panic and oversimplified predictions of an impending food crisis, which contribute to price volatility. "It is important to underline – and we've...
More »Who is responsible for India's poor – the state or the private sector?
Regulation in India's microfinance sector aims to address feckless borrowing and reckless lending – but will the new restrictions entrench poverty, rather than end it? One of the many crushing burdens for India's poor bear is debt; unable to make ends meet, they turn to traditional moneylenders. They are willing to extend credit, but at unconscionably high rates – sometimes exceeding 80%, and keeping borrowers in lifelong penury. Popular cinema and...
More »Activist Outrage at the UN Climate Conference by Anne Petermann and Orin Langelle
During protests against the WTO (World Trade Organization) meetings in Cancún, Mexico in September 2003, Lee Kyung Hae, a South Korean farmer and La Via Campesina member, martyred himself by plunging a knife into his heart while standing atop the barricades at Kilometer Zero. Around his neck was a sign that read, "WTO Kills Farmers." At that time, activists around the world were rallying under the umbrella of the global justice...
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