India may witness record foodgrains production in the 2010-11 crop year, surpassing the previous high of 234.47 million tonnes seen in 2008-09, due to an increase in the acreage under cultivation in the ongoing rabi season, a top Agriculture Ministry official said on Tuesday. "It is very much achievable. Any fall in rice production from 2008-09 levels can be compensated by higher production of wheat, pulses and coarse cereals," Agriculture Secretary...

The Centre has given the states another 50 lakh tonnes of wheat and rice stocks, half of which will be sold to the poor at subsidised rates as food prices continue their steep climb. An empowered group of ministers (EGoM), headed by finance minister Pranab Mukherjee, also decided to extend the ban on pulses exports and allow duty-free imports of pulses till March 2012. “In today’s EGoM meeting, it was decided to...

In more ways than one the calendar year 2010 would go down the memory lane as a watershed year for the food and agriculture front in the country which recorded unprecedented growth rate of 4.4 per cent in July-September quarter but by December unprecedented price hike of essential food items especially left consumers in tears.   As the year comes to an end, an embattled government and the Union agriculture ministry stood...

Even as the media celebrate the Mercedes Benz deal in the Marathwada region as a sign of “rural resurgence,” the latest data show that 17,368 farmers killed themselves in the year of the “resurgence.” When businessmen from Aurangabad in the backward Marathwada region bought 150 Mercedes Benz luxury cars worth Rs. 65 crore at one go in October, it grabbed media attention. The top public sector bank, State Bank of India,...

A sea water farming project and a genetic garden of Halophytes are being launched at Vedaranyam today The year 2010 marks the 80th anniversary of the Salt Satyagraha launched at Dandi by Mahatma Gandhi and at Vedaranyam by Rajaji to establish that sea water is a social resource. A Sea Water Farming project and a Genetic Garden of Halophytes are being launched at Vedaranyam on December 26, 2010 to initiate a...