There’s both good news and bad news on the food front.   The good news is that wheat, maize and pulses production during the current year will be the highest that India has seen. Wheat production was expected to be high, thanks to the twin advantages of a high procurement price —- higher than international prices —- and favourable weather conditions. But pulses production too has zoomed, because of the soaring prices in the...

The chamber said concrete steps need to be taken to promote investment, given that recent data shows the investment growth rate slowed from 38.1% in 2007-08 to 36.5% in 2009-10 The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) on Tuesday called for the government to provide tax incentives on agricultural activities in the forthcoming Budget to encourage private participation and adoption of new technologies in the sector. “CII has recommended encouraging private sector participation...

And you thought you could get information from the State using the RTI Act? Take your place in the line behind thousands of frustrated citizens The government is considering changes to the Right To Information Act (RTI) that activists feel could dilute the power of the Act. Former Chief Justice of India K.G. Balakrishnan has recommended protecting the judiciary from RTI queries apparently on grounds that the move would “erode” the...

Key issue will be legal guarantees for food entitlements for “general” category In what looks like more trouble for the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government, the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council (NAC) has decided to take head on the Rangarajan committee's criticism of its now-controversial recommendations on food security. It will take the first step by presenting a point-by-point rebuttal of the panel's critique to the new Food Minister, K.V. Thomas, on...

The European Commission’s decision to exclude two key ozone-depleting gases from the purview of carbon trading from 2013 would have negative implications for global warming. The two industrial emissions marked for this purpose are Hydrofluorocarbon-23 (HFC-23), essentially trifluoromethane, and nitrous oxide. These are highly potent greenhouse gases (GHGs) that together account for the bulk of the trade under the EU’s emission trading system, which is, by far, the world’s largest...