Riding on high sales of its snacks brands like Lays and Uncle Chipps, Pepsico has engaged 12,000 farmers across the country for contract farming of potato. "There are 12,000 farmers doing contract farming of potato for us involving 16,000 acres of land," Executive Vice-president of Pepsico Holdings (agro-business) Nischint Bhatia said. He said that out of the 12,000 farmers, 6,500 of them are in West Bengal working 2,600 acres. Bhatia...

IMAGINE THE lowly brinjal you have always known turning into a sci-fi gizmo — with an uncharted potency for good and evil. Imagine a food turned into a pesticide — and you will have a measure of the essential uncertainty around Bt brinjal. When Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh announced his indefinite moratorium on Bt brinjal on February 9, he halted a juggernaut that could have swept India to a point...

The current food inflation is a result of food output growth not keeping pace with population growth Few recall that, just last month, there was a food security summit in Rome. In sharp contrast to the almost overwhelming coverage of the Copenhagen climate summit, it attracted far lesser attention from the heads of governments, as also from the media. This is somewhat strange as a food (and water) crisis can hit...

The Indian economy is picking up and should be able to expand at eight to nine per cent. It is high time that the government initiates a universal public distribution system covering at least the essential commodities. Incomes of the rich will go up and India will be a major player in the world when it revives. But the bulk of the population, about 70 per cent, will remain poor with...

Agriculture is not just a food producing machine but the backbone of the livelihood of 60 per cent of Indians. The extensive drought spotlights a situation of mass rural deprivation and a mindset that is insensitive to it. But there are some encouraging signs. What should be done to meet the challenge?  There are reports in financial newspapers that the ongoing drought affecting nearly 200 districts in the country may...