-The Hindu     Aberrations in monsoon behaviour are not uncommon. What is new is the difficulty in forecasting caused by factors coming under the generic title, ‘Climate change.' Forecasts by the South Asian Climate Outlook Forum and the India Meteorological Department indicate that the south-west monsoon rainfall may be deficient. Also, there is a possibility of the evolution of an El Niño event during June to September. There is a 45 per cent...

-The Hindu     TIRUCHI: The day-long workshop on "Food without preservatives" featured two sessions - one on grandma's recipes and the other on importance of millets for effective functioning of the brain and body. The importance of consuming healthy food without preservatives and the benefits of using millets in one's daily diet were explained to parents (mothers) of autistic children during the one-day workshop on "Autism vs. food" organised at Pravaag Transitional Centre...

-DNA Farmers' suicides are as much a consequence of indebtedness as the failure of the government to offer solutions to make agriculture a viable profession. Astring of farmers' suicides, in the aftermath of hailstorms and unseasonal rainfall over the past fortnight, in Maharashtra sheds light on the parlous state of Indian agriculture. National Crime Records BUreau (NCRB) statistics tell us that over 2.8 lakh farmers have committed suicide since 1995. Though attempts...

-The Financial Express The Indian success story increasingly looks like a tale of naivety and optimistic complacency. The Indian success story increasingly looks like a tale of naivety and optimistic complacency, with the fantasy of ‘India Shining' obfuscating the reality of widespread deprivation. Despite rapid economic growth during the past decade, millions continue to live in poverty and hunger. The Indian government aims to address abject hunger and malnutrition with the National Food...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Fertilizer minister Srikant Jena may keep claiming that annually 30 lakh tonne of highly subsidized Urea for agriculture is being smuggled to chemical factories, but the government says states have reported only 24 such cases since 2010-11. Jena had recently said at a conference of Indian Fertilizer Association (IFA) that there are serious signs of mismanagement in an information technology-driven era when targeted farmers can be...