-The Times of India NEW DELHI: India has made good progress in its weather forecasting system but its benefits still elude farmers and other citizens as the country's capacity to predict Extreme Weather phenomena is restricted to the district level. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) will soon overcome its limitation by expanding its high-tech forecast facilities down to block level and extend its direct SMS alert system by adding 21 million...
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Despite having a food security legislation, spending on food subsidy is low
Recent data from the National Family Health Survey-4 (NFHS-4) shows that about one-third of children in India is undernourished – 35.7 percent children below 5 years are underweight (too thin for age), 38.4 percent are stunted (too short for age) and 21.0 percent are wasted (too thin for height). It is also revealed that the level of anaemia among women and girls (aged 15-49 years) has stagnated marginally over the...
More »Hard reality and political compulsions may force a rural-focused budget
Budgetary allocation to a particular sector indicates how much priority the government assigns to that sector as compared to the rest. A preliminary analysis by the Inclusive Media for Change team indicates that the actual expenditure (net of receipts and recoveries) by two of the country’s most important ministries, namely the Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare (MoAFW) and the Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD) was less than 1 percent...
More »Will 'climate smart agriculture' serve the public interest - or the drive for growing profits for private corporations? -Peter Newell, Jennifer Clapp & Zoe W Brent
-TheEcologist.org 'Climate smart agriculture' has become the buzz phrase at high level international policy discussions. But now there is a struggle over its definition. Is it the latest manifestation for corporate social responsibility or the title of a manifesto for real, grassroots led, change, ask PETER NEWELL, JENNIFER CLAPP and ZOE BRENT The race is on to deliver models of agricultural development that are viable and sustainable in a world of...
More »What to expect in 2018 from the farm sector: prices could hold key to several political fortunes -Harish Damodaran & Parthasarathi Biswas
-The Indian Express Agricultural prices crashed in April-June, just when a bumper rabi crop had been harvested after two years of drought, and despite demonetisation. 2017 was agriculture’s annus horribilis. The reason wasn’t monsoon failure (as in 2014 and 2015) or unseasonal rain and hail (as in March 2015); the year was, in fact, largely free of Extreme Weather events, resulting in a record output of wheat, pulses, cotton, potato and a...
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