-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Aam Aadmi Party is inking its agriculture policy to connect with rural voters and expand its support base. Apart from farm production, the policy will focus on ensuring income security for farmers through a series of measures including a farmers' income commission, increasing access to insurance and credit facilities for tenant farmers and improving rural infrastructure. Recent data from the National Crime Records Bureau show...

-The Hindu Kerala severely threatened by climate change, says State Action Plan on Climate Change Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala): Alappuzha, Palakkad, Wayanad and Idukki districts are climate change hotspots in Kerala, with a high degree of vulnerability to natural hazards like flood and drought and impact on biodiversity and human life. The State Action Plan on Climate Change (SAPCC) has classified Alappuzha and Palakkad as the most vulnerable districts. Palakkad is listed as very highly...

-The Business Standard Inflation has cooled in recent months but the next monsoon holds the key. With fear of an El Niño effect impacting it, academicians and policy makers are worried about the possible impact on farm output and food inflation. Prabhu Pingali, director of the Tata-Cornell Agriculture and Nutrition Initiative at Cornell University and former director of the agricultural and development economics division of the Food and Agriculture Organization,...

-Press Information Bureau (Ministry of Agriculture) The two-day National Conference on Agriculture for Kharif Campaign has come out with detailed strategy for maximising crop production during the coming kharif season. The focus will be on ensuring timely availability of fertilizers and quality seed and also sufficient credit to farmers. Based on inputs from States and the Fertilizer Ministry, it is established that sufficient quantities of fertilizers and seeds are available in...

-Economic and Political Weekly   The rural labour market is undergoing significant changes mainly due to rising employment opportunities outside agriculture. The real wage rate for farm as well as non-farm rural labour is moving upwards. This has serious implications for the farm sector. This study examines the trend and pattern of rural labour diversification and identifies the underlying factors for this change. The movement of workers outside the agriculture sector was...