-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Storms across the country have killed more people since April 11 than all of last year. Since Sunday, thunderstorms claimed 94 lives across six states, taking the death toll in storms since April to 278. Fatalities in the first two weeks of May stand at 223, while 55 people died in April. Last year, storms claimed 197 lives, while the toll in 2016 was 216. The...
More »SEARCH RESULT
How to improve agricultural productivity -Bjorn lomborg & Saleema Razvi
-Livemint.com Investments in irrigation, combined with better-quality seeds, can dramatically improve returns to farming Global attention has been devoted to water scarcity and its effect on Indian farmers. However, new analysis from Indian researchers suggests that far more good could come if irrigation were combined with seed improvement. Tata Trusts and Copenhagen Consensus have commissioned new research by noted experts from India and around the world, looking at measures that would help Indian...
More »PM2.5 levels rising in proportion to stubble burning, finds Nasa study -Jayashree Nandi
-The Times of India NEW DELHI: A new study by Nasa scientists has concluded that there is a strong link between agricultural fires in Punjab and Haryana and PM2.5 levels in Delhi during the post-monsoon months of October and November. PM2.5 concentrations in Delhi, which is downwind to Punjab and Haryana, show a coherent increase — rising often from as low as 50 micrograms per cubic metres (µg/ m3) before the...
More »The storm brewing in India's cotton fields -Jaideep Hardikar
-RuralIndiaOnline.org Bt-cotton occupies 90 per cent of the land under cotton in India – and the pests that this GM variety was meant to safeguard against, are back, virulently and now pesticide-resistant – destroying crops and farmers The black scars dotting the green bolls of a wilting cotton plant on Ganesh Wadandre’s farm carried a message for scientists working on the ‘white gold’: go find a new antidote. “Those are the entry points,”...
More »Direct income transfers will help farmers more than minimum support prices, says new report -Mridula Chari
-Scroll.in A new report says that a crop-neutral direct payout scheme might be better than paying farmers the difference between market price and production cost. Raising minimum support prices to 1.5 times the cost of production could severely distort agricultural markets, suggests a new report from the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations. The report takes a look at government schemes to bolster the crop procurement process. The Centre offers...
More »