-The Economic Times NEW DELHI: As sowing picks up across the country, the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) on Thursday approved increasing the minimum support prices (MSP) of kharif crops for 2013-14 crop year (July-June). The increase is expected to boost the sowing of paddy, cotton, oilseeds like soybean, millets and pulses crop in the country. On the basis of recommendations given by Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP),...

-The Times of India BHUBANESWAR: Chief minister NaveenPatnaik on Tuesday distributed 5,000 mobile phones to farmers saying that the instrument would help them plan farming, track market price of various agricultural produce and weather. Officials said IIT-Kanpur had provided the multi-application technological support using which farmers can get the required information through voice call and SMS in local language. "Information will be obtained free and the recurring mobile call expenses, whatever, would...

-Outlook As the Manmohan Singh government makes evident its unfriendliness to villages, the nation hurtles towards disaster. It's a danger no one wants to face. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been trying for years to make us believe that agriculture is a vast marshland in which a huge population is stuck ankle- to neck-deep and it is his duty to rescue them. "Our salvation lies in moving people out of agriculture," he...

-IPS News ROME: The growing consensus, momentum and commitment to eradicate world hunger may seem overly ambitious in view of the slow progress in reducing the number of hungry people in the world in recent decades. After all, declining food prices in the second half of the 20th century, thanks to increasing production, were not enough to eliminate poverty and hunger in the world. In the 1960s and 1970s, many governments invested a...

-The United Nations Given the right conditions and targeted support, small farmers can unleash a new and sustainable agricultural revolution, the United Nations environment agency a partner agricultural development organization reported today on the eve of World Environment Day. According to the report, Smallholders, Food Security and the Environment, an estimated 2.5 billion people who manage 500 million smallholder farm households provide over 80 per cent of the food consumed in much...