-The Hindu Sample size 5,000 households with 11,000 interviewees Price rise, not corruption, will be the most important issue for farmers when they go to vote in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, says a Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) random survey. The sample size comprised 5,000 farming households with 11,000 interviewees including 4,298 women and 2,115 youths. Issues of unemployment and lack of irrigation will be other concerns that...

-The Business Standard Inflation has cooled in recent months but the next monsoon holds the key. With fear of an El Niño effect impacting it, academicians and policy makers are worried about the possible impact on farm output and food inflation. Prabhu Pingali, director of the Tata-Cornell Agriculture and Nutrition Initiative at Cornell University and former director of the agricultural and development economics division of the Food and Agriculture Organization,...

-The Financial Express The urgent need to end world hunger appears to have promoted superfood crops at the expense of nutritional diversity Finally, we know why India is facing a spurt in diet-linked lifestyle disorders while it continues to struggle to feed the hungry. The paradox is seen in several developing economies, the answer is easily hazarded but now, for the first time, a formal study by the International Centre for Tropical...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Minimum support price (MSP) of most of the food-grains has been increased by over 100% in the past 10 years, but it hardly benefited farmers in eastern and central India as majority there have not even heard of such procurement system. The situation is equally bad in other parts - except in states like Punjab, Haryana, Maharashtra and Western Uttar Pradesh - where farmers don't get...

-Down to Earth Delisting fruits and vegetables from APMC Act in Congress-ruled states will not benefit farmers Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi last December said fruits and vegetables will become affordable if states allowed farmers to directly sell their produce to consumers. He also directed the chief ministers in Congress-ruled states to delist fruits and vegetables from the Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) Act. The Act makes it mandatory for farmers to sell...