-The Hindu A.R. Avaneendranathan, a dairy farmer, aims at popularising native breeds of farm animals “This cow is 83 cm tall, just six cm more than the shortest cow entered in the Guinness Book of World Records. I bought her at Badiyadukka in Kasaragod district. She is a Kasaragod dwarf breed of cattle but has the characteristics of a Malnad Gidda, which is also a dwarf breed. This breed can survive on...

-The Hindu Intelligent management of ecosystems can help to turn local economies around and give destitute households a chance to increase their incomes Protecting biodiversity is humanity’s insurance policy against the unprecedented biodiversity loss and ecosystem degradation which has occurred in recent decades, undermining the very foundations of life on earth. This is why this week’s 11th Conference of Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity in Hyderabad, which India is hosting, is...

-The Hindu India Against Corruption should realise the ‘aam aadmi’ needs not only decentralised power but also a lofty vision There are two underlying themes of India Against Corruption’s new party: the induction of good people and “people’s power” through consummate decentralisation. The vision document sets out a quest for “swaraj,” people’s right to self-determination. This ideal of self-determination has been conflated with direct democracy. Thus the vision document indicates that “as...

-The Hindu Family’s economic condition, their willingness to allow the girl child to continue studying and the literacy status of the mother were found to be among the key determinates among educationally backward families in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand that prevented girls from getting secondary education. According to a study report “The state of the girl child in India-2012’’ released here on Tuesday by non-government organisation Plan India that looked at...

-The United Nations Almost 870 million people, or one in eight, are suffering from chronic malnutrition, according to a new United Nations report released today, which shows a sharp decline in the number of undernourished people over the past two decades, but warns that immediate action is still needed to tackle hunger particularly in developing countries. The State of Food Insecurity in the World 2012 (SOFI), which was jointly published by the Food and...