-The Hindu Business Line   There's no Malthusian problem right now, but without sustainable farming the world will be in serious trouble Food security, a seemingly innocuous phrase, is fast becoming one of the most widely discussed topics of our time. A lot of us would associate ‘food security' as a challenge for the impoverished but it could potentially become a much more widespread problem straddling across geographic and economic divides. The issue of...

-The Times of India AURANGABAD: With Marathwada being most affected by drought and near-total loss of crops forcing more than 500 farmers to commit suicide during the past one year, noted economist and former member of Maharashtra State Planning Board, H M Desarda, has suggested to the state government that there is immediate need to return to the low external input sustainable agriculture (LEISA), which alone can rescue farmers from the...

-The Hindu Hyderabad (Telengana): Cultivation of paddy in the ongoing rabi season in Telangana is expected to come down by about 20 to 25 per cent because of persisting power shortage and depletion of groundwater table in the State. The Agriculture Department in association with the power distribution companies is already running a publicity campaign in villages for over a month now discouraging paddy cultivation during the rabi season. Of the 13.09...

-The Hindu Business Line   Cocoa has enriched the lifestyle of one lakh farmers in the four southern States When Cadbury India (now Mondelez India Foods Ltd) representatives approached Sabapathy, a coconut farmer at Sethumadai village, 16 km from Pollachi in Tamil Nadu, with some cocoa seedling to be raised as an intercrop in his coconut grove, Sabapathy says he was not interested at all. "They did not give up and I ultimately gave...

-The Hindu Nidoda Vaijanath, who follows an integrated farming model, keeps himself updated by reading, consulting scientists Bidar (Karnataka): How many crops can you grow on six acres? For this enterprising farmer from Bidar, the answer is 11. Nidoda Vaijanath of Kamathana village also keeps cows, buffaloes and sheep and also has a mini-poultry farm. His farm has small patches covered with fig, cashew, ginger, watermelon, lime, mosambi, drumstick, brinjal, coriander, mango and curry...