-Hindustan Times Good pre-monsoon showers— which have been either surplus or normal in nearly half of the country— have come as a boost for a crisis-ridden farm sector, bolstering prospects of sowing and easing some of the government’s worries.   The showers, aided by seasonal storms, have been sufficient to meet farmers’ requirements for planting key summer crops, prompting millions to head out to fields across states.   The rains have replenished 81 “nationally...

-Livemint.com Experts outline steps to tackle the woes of the rain-dependent sector, with Met dept seeing a below-normal monsoon Agriculture in India is going through one of its worst periods in recent times. On the one hand farm incomes have been dented by falling prices of crops—both of key crops like rice, wheat and cotton as well as cash crops like rubber, basmati rice, guar gum and potatoes. On the other,...

-Frontline Outcomes of the patterns of growth induced by neoliberal economic reforms have increased the disproportionality between agricultural and non-agricultural growth, and with costs rising and prices not keeping pace, agriculture is becoming increasingly unviable. FARMERS across northern and central India-in Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana and elsewhere-are distressed. Unseasonal rains have damaged their standing crop and help from the government has been meagre and slow in coming. This, however, is...

-Business Standard Marriages on hold, children being returned from schools over unpaid fees; the rural economy is bearing the brunt of unseasonal rains, a crisis in the sugar cane sector and a fall in prices of farm pro Hapur/ Meerut: In the mid-afternoon, when most farmers are returning home to rest, Rana Ranjit Singh is sweating buckets on his farm in Uttar Pradesh's Hapur district, searching for vegetables left undamaged after untimely...

-The Indian Express The Union budget is largely about the intentions and policies of the government of the day, as well as the arithmetic of resource mobilisation and allocation to achieve certain ends in the economy. The diagnostics of various economic problems and their probable solutions are generally found in the Economic Survey. The Economic Survey clearly indicates that growth in agri-GDP in FY15 has collapsed to just 1.1 per cent, while...