-India Today Once the government gives final approval, it will be another three years before farmers can begin commercial cultivation using GM mustard seeds Approval for the environmental release of genetically modified (GM) mustard—Dhara Mustard Hybrid-11 (DMH-11)—across India has not come a day too soon. The GM crops regulator, the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee (GEAC), had cleared GM mustard in 2017 but the Indian government raised questions and asked for more studies,...

In the absence of income or expenditure-based headcount ratio, the growth in the real wages (i.e., nominal wages adjusted against retail inflation) of the manual workers is considered to be a good proxy to assess the trends in poverty. This is because the manual, unskilled/ semi-skilled labourers exist at the bottom of the pyramid or economic hierarchy, and most of them belong to the social categories Scheduled Castes (SCs) and...

-Press release by Institute for Agriculture & Trade Policy (IATP)* dated March 4, 2022 A new evaluation has exposed the serious failures of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) — in its attempt to address hunger and farmer poverty. Funded by Gates, USAID, and western governments, for 15 years AGRA has promoted high-input agriculture, synthetic fertilizers, commercial seeds and subsidies to "catalyze a farming revolution in Africa." This evaluation...

-Counterview.net The Covid-19 crisis has highlighted the risks of an unhealthy diet and the extreme fragility of food systems. The economic reconstruction that will follow the pandemic is the perfect opportunity to provide better nutrition and health to all. The pandemic should spur us to redefine how we feed ourselves, and agricultural research can play a vital role in making our food systems more sustainable and resilient. Family-owned farms still produce some...

-The Hindu Business Line Noted Gandhian economist Dr Sudarshan Iyengar surveys the distressed agricultural landscape, pinpoints its weaknesses, and prescribes solutions with their roots in Gandhian agronomics. Edited excerpts from an interview to BusinessLine: * Given the agrarian crisis in India today, how relevant are Gandhi's economic principles based on the village economy, and equitable distribution of resources? They are relevant in the context of Gandhi's view of gram swaraj (village self-rule), which...