-The Hindu But an Assocham study has warned of an increase in prices Amid concern that the price of rice may be next to shoot up after those of pulses and onion, trade bodies put forth divergent views. V.S. Sethia, former president and currently a governing council member of the All-India Rice Export Association, told The Hindu that apprehensions of a sharp rise in rice price were baseless as ample stock of regular...

-FirstPost.com Even as the Narendra Modi government has been making claims that India’s rural economy has gained pace under his rule, empirical evidence suggests that the health of country’s rural economy may not have improved much on account of declining or stagnant income levels. The situation, experts say, is unlikely to change in the near future as there are low chances of a revival in rural income generation. A survey by brokerage...

-Hindustan Times Rohtak: The Jind district administration has successfully completed the pilot project of linking land record with the aadhaar card to check corruption in the revenue department. Jind deputy commissioner Ajit Balaji Joshi said that Union government had identified two villages — Jaipur and Bishrapura — of the district under the pilot project. He said the work of linking land record with aadhaar card has been completed. He said the step would...

-Economic and Political Weekly Despite favourable policy measures, growth of financial institutions and public interventions in the marketing of agricultural produce, the structure of punjab's agricultural economy makes farmers dependent on commission agents. These agents trap the farmers in a vicious circle of indebtedness. Based on a field survey, this study locates the commission agent system in punjab's agriculture set-up and recommends reframing it in order to extricate farmers from the...

-Down to Earth A few villages in Haryana successfully grow cotton amid widespread destruction of the crop by whitefly in the region LOOK HERE, the red pest you see is Chrysopa,” says an excited Manisha, while navigating through her cotton field in Haryana’s Nidana village. “A single Chrysopa, a carnivorous pest, eats around 125-150 whiteflies a day,” says the 24-year-old. Further ahead in her 0.8-hectare cotton plantation, she picks another plant leaf...