-Livemint.com * At a time when rural incomes are sliding, the only existing safety net for the farmer is failing * High costs of reinsurance due to erratic Weather, a spike in claims, political interference in crop loss estimation are reasons that forced some insurers to leave the business NEW DELHI: Santosh Kumar’s first brush with insurance left a bitter aftertaste. A farmer’s son, 26-year-old Kumar from Bihar’s Araria district felt betrayed when...

-The Hindu Business Line The maximum crop damage was reported from Western Madhya Pradesh, which received 61 per cent surplus rains. Excess monsoon rains and the floods caused by them affected crops in many States, including Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka and Punjab, according to a kharif crop damage report released by private Weather forecaster Skymet on Tuesday.   While 40 to 50 per cent of soyabean crop has been hit in Madhya...

  Air quality in North India in general and Delhi National Capital Region (Delhi NCR) in particular plunged to its lowest point in recent years during October-November thanks to a variety of factors. Through media reports one comes to know that stubble burning (also called paddy straw burning/ crop residue burning) is chiefly responsible for the public health crisis in India's capital and its nearby regions. Data accessed from the website...

-Down to Earth We are doing too little too late We can’t breathe in Delhi. It is a public health emergency as pollutants in the air have spiked to extremely toxic levels. Officially, the air quality is in the severe+ zone, which means that it is bad for even the healthy, forget about what it will do to our children, aged and the already vulnerable. But what I want to discuss is...

-Livemint.com * E-trading introduced as part of agriculture reforms has had limited impact on farmers, say farm experts * E-trading has had limited impact on the agricultural community, which continues to be at the mercy of the middlemen BENGALURU: It has been four months since 24-year-old Chandan from Mallehalli village in Mysuru district sold his produce of around 1,000kg of tomatoes in the local market. At nearly Rs.500 for 20kg, prices were good...