-RuralIndiaOnline.org In Rayagada, Bt cotton acreage has risen by 5,200 per cent in 16 years. The result: this biodiversity hotspot, rich in indigenous millets, rice varieties and forest foods, is seeing an alarming ecological shift “Everybody is doing it. So we are too,” said Rupa Pirikaka, somewhat uncertainly. ‘It’ is genetically modified (GM) Bt cotton seeds, now easily bought at the local market, or even in one’s own village. ‘Everybody’ is countless other...

-The Hindu Business Line New Delhi: Even as Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan claimed on Thursday that onion prices have started cooling down in both retail and wholesale markets, Shetkari Sanghatana, an apex Farmers’ body in Maharashtra, announced that all onion markets would be indefinitely closed from October 7 if the Centre failed to revoke its decision to ban onion exports and imposition of stock limits on traders. Retail onion prices, which...

-Down to Earth One of the major causes behind suicidal intent is depression, experts find while studying cases in Punjab, Telangana and Maharashtra Farmer suicides, which have till now been studied economically and agriculturally, are now being looked at from behavioural and psychological angles. A study is being conducted under the National Agricultural Science Fund of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) in three states — Punjab, Telangana and Maharashtra. Punjab Agricultural University...

-The Hindu Business Line Farmers’ organisations have threatened to disrupt the functioning of Agriculture Produce Market Committees (APMC) in Maharashtra if the Centre sticks to its stand of prohibiting onion exports and imposing limits on stocks. Farmers in the onion hub of Nashik said that they would agitate against the government’s decision as Farmers are facing the brunt. With onion prices rising, the government had on Sunday prohibited exports until further notice and...

-The Indian Express Punjab government’s data states that 3,330 Farmers have taken their lives due to farm debt since 2000 till date, of which 698 committed suicide in the past four years, most of them in the Malwa region. Over the past few years, ‘farm debt’ has been one of the main reasons behind Farmers and farm labourers committing suicide in Punjab. Farmer groups, state universities’ and government data have indicated...