-The United Nations The goal of reducing by half the number of people without access to safe drinking water has been achieved, well ahead of the 2015 deadline for reaching the globally agreed development targets aimed at ridding the world of extreme poverty, hunger and preventable diseases, the United Nations said today. Between 1990 and 2010, over two billion people gained access to improved drinking water sources, such as piped supplies and...

The Samajwadi Party's resounding victory in the Uttar Pradesh assembly polls is certain to add more heft to the Federal Front - the alliance of non-Congress, non-BJP chief ministers put together by West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee.  Mulayam Singh Yadav's party was handed a decisive mandate by the electorate, and it will not have to be dependent on Congress, or any other party for its survival.  The snub by voters in...

-Reuters The Indian government has no plans to buy farmland abroad or help private companies do so, agriculture minister Sharad Pawar said on Monday, after a local media report said New Delhi was debating the issue. “There is no government proposal. The ministry has not taken up this proposal,” Pawar told reporters. The Economic Times had in its Monday edition quoted the ministry’s top civil servant, farm secretary P K Basu, saying it...

India’s decision-makers seem to find it difficult to see that there are children in the country. Being unable to see them, they are unable to perceive that they are hungry. In an age when we are able to use euphemisms like ‘under-nutrition’, this is perhaps not surprising. But it is disgraceful none the less.   This country has a large population of children. Fortyone per cent of its total numbers. The national...

The government has decided to throw its might behind private purchases of farm land overseas to ensure food security for India.  The agriculture ministry has sought views from other ministries on an institutional mechanism to extend sovereign support to India Inc's acquisition of farm land abroad that could include guaranteed buyback of harvest from the cultivation overseas.  Agriculture secretary PK Basu said that the proposal is in a nascent stage. "We had...