Global food prices increased for the eighth consecutive month in February, with prices of all commodity groups monitored rising again, except for sugar, FAO said today. FAO expects a tightening of the global cereal supply and demand balance in 2010/11. In the face of a growing demand and a decline in world cereal production in 2010, global cereal stocks this year are expected to fall sharply because of a decline in...
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India set to grow biofortified crop by Jyotika Sood
INDIA will soon be the first country to commercially cultivate biofortified pearl millet, or bajra. The crop has been biofortified to improve its iron and zinc nutrients, and will be released in 2012 by HarvestPlus, a global alliance of research and implementing agencies. To be distributed in Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh, the crop has been developed by HarvestPlus’ sister concern International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT)....
More »Global food prices increase for eighth straight month, UN agency reports
Global food prices rose for the eighth straight month in February, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reported today, while also warning that unexpected spikes in oil prices could exacerbate an already precarious situation in food markets. The FAO Food Price Index – a measure of basic food prices at the international level – averaged 236 points in February, up 2.2 per cent from January, the highest record in...
More »India’s farmers reap little despite rising food prices by James Lamont
Ram Dia Singh was ready to chuck in his life as a farmer in northern India to embrace that of an ascetic in the foothills of the Himalayan mountains. When he consulted his guru in the hill town of Solan, instead of being welcomed into a holy order he was instructed to return to the land and do good works among fellow farmers who increasingly struggle to eke out a living...
More »Check leakages to execute food Act efficiently
Increase in offtake under various public distribution schemes. Supply of wheat and rice will have to be doubled if the proposed National Food Security Act for targeted beneficiaries is implemented with the current delivery mechanism, in which leakages are too high, the Economic Survey for 2010-11 has said. “Once we give a legal guarantee to people about the food that they are to receive, if we try to deliver on this promise...
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