The sugarcane growers in Orissa’s Ganjam district have urged the authorities of Aska Cooperative Sugar Industry (ACSI) to fix the cane price at ' 2500 per quintal at the field level during the coming crushing season. The factory authorities had paid '1700 per quintal to the cane growers last year. The sugarcane farmers want increase in cane prices to be announced before the start of the crushing season which begins from...

The Centre has asked Food Corporation of India (FCI) to procure PAU-201 paddy that conforms with its specifications and dispose of the rest in the open market through tenders. A decision on whether the PAU-201 paddy variety is fit for human consumption was raised at a high-level meeting between Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar and Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, recently. FCI officials in Punjab are giving final touches to the modalities to...

Members of the National Advisory Council (NAC) Aruna Roy and Jean Dreze have accused the UPA government of being “increasingly anti-labour” in their assessement of the national rural employment guarantee programme, on its fifth anniversary. With support from several activists associated with the government’s flagship social sector scheme, they have alleged that the “contractor mafia”is increasingly dominating in the states, minimising the potential to create remunerative employment through the programme. According to...

In response to the Supreme Court order on rotting foodgrain, the Centre has decided to distribute wheat and rice to poor families at Rs 2 and Rs 3 per kilo, respectively. The Ministry of Food and Public Distribution System is also expected to brief the apex court on the steps taken to address the problem. In a letter to all states, the Centre has urged the state PDS machinery to distribute...

With more than 400 million Indians going to bed hungry each day, food security has become a crucial issue. On June 4 last year, the president made an announcement: “My government proposes to enact a new law — the National Food Security Act — that will provide statutory basis for a framework which assures food security for all. Every family below the poverty line in rural as well as urban...