When one of the three farm laws i.e., The Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020 was enacted last year, it was argued by its proponents that the legislation would allow the farmers to sell their produce (and the traders to purchase that produce) outside the Agricultural Produce Market Committee-APMC mandis after crop harvesting. In a way, that particular piece of legislation was enacted to end the...

-TheWire.in Apple growers feel that instead of incentivising big corporates, the state government should instead help farmers build cold storages. Chandigarh: The main argument of those rallying behind the Bharatiya Janata Party government’s controversial farm laws; that the free market economy will reward farmers, faces a major dent in the wake of the crashing market price of the apple crop in Himachal Pradesh.  The Rs 5,000 crore apple business in the hilly state,...

The recently released quarterly Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) data broadly confirms the dip in employment and jobs during the countrywide lockdown period, followed by a certain degree of recovery in the post-lockdown months last year as have been indicated by various survey-based studies and research papers. The quarterly bulletin on PLFS provides data on key employment and unemployment indicators i.e. Unemployment Rate (UR), Worker Population Ratio (WPR) and Labour...

Scientific knowledge has immensely helped in combating the dreadful coronavirus and its spread. Within a record short period of time, scientists (including virologists, epidemiologists, biostatisticians, etc.) and their research outputs helped the commoners to learn more about the SARS-CoV-2 and how it spreads from one individual to the next one. Common people have now come to know how simple techniques and behavioural change like the wearing of N95 masks, maintaining...

-Newsclick.in Nearly 93% of the Indian garment workers were pushed below the international poverty line of the World Bank in April and May, 2020 Garment workers lost a significant amount of wage during the pandemic in six Asian countries including India. Workers’ wages were at poverty levels even before the pandemic, and were pushed further below the International Poverty Line in their countries by the pandemic, according to a recent report titled...