-The Telegraph New Delhi: The government today conceded there were shortcomings in the Prime Minister Crop Insurance scheme and asked states to set up their own insurance companies to prevent "malpractices" by private firms. Speaking during a five-hour debate on the agrarian crisis in the Lok Sabha late on Wednesday night, agriculture minister Radha Mohan Singh said: "There are shortcomings in the implementation although the modified scheme is very good. We are...

-The Times of India BENGALURU: Notwithstanding the consecutive years of drought over the past three years, Karnataka farmers earned 38% in 2015-16 from sale of agri-commodities through the e-trading interface Unified Market Platform (UMP), according to a Niti Aayog report. The income is expected to double in 2016-17 with many more markets coming under UMP, said a senior agriculture marketing official. UMP, an initiative of the Rashtriya e-Market Services Ltd (ReMS), is...

-The Hindu Business line Distressed farmers are demanding loan waivers, but that should not deflect focus from what needs to be done and undone to address the root cause of the agrarian crisis The farmers’ unrest across the country, and particularly across several BJP-ruled States, appears to have caught the central government by surprise. But it should really not have done so. Ever since candidate Narendra Modi in 2014 promised the farmers...

-The Indian Express Branding the farmer agitations ‘political’ betrays a lack of understanding There is no proof required that economists commenting on farmer issues have reached an affliction point. When the counsellor one seeks advice from is as callous as saying that the farmers’ agitation was political and justifies it by citing declining farmer suicides and rising farmer prosperity (‘Just why are farmers rioting?’ by Surjit Bhalla, IE, June 10), one can’t...

-The Hindu Business Line Crop gets Rs. 50,000 to Rs. 1 lakh per quintal Jaipur: As part of its crop diversification efforts, Rajasthan will encourage over 50,000 farmers to take up cultivation of super foodgrain quinoa this year, said State Agriculture and Animal Husbandry Minister Prabhu Lal Saini. Rajasthan State Seeds Corporation, which engaged some farmers to grow quinoa seeds on an experimental basis, has managed to raise over 20,000 quintals of seed...