-The Telegraph The tearing hurry with which agriculture market reforms have been pushed through, without even consulting farmers, has resulted in huge farm protests in Punjab and Haryana At a time when I see euphoria among mainstream economists over the new set of agricultural reforms, media reports say that the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices has observed that only 12 per cent of India’s paddy cultivators were able to sell their...

-The Tribune With APMC markets heading towards a collapse, the new set of reforms is aimed at encouraging corporatisation, with big business moving into agriculture, storage and marketing. As the experience of US/Europe shows, when unregulated markets become dominant, small farmers are the first to be pushed out of agriculture. Reiterating what former US Agriculture Secretary Earl Butz (during Ronald Reagan’s rule) had declared: “Get big or get out,” Sonny Perdue, US...

-Down to Earth The pesticides in question continue to be used in India, but are already banned, restricted or withdrawn in other countries Several experts underscored the ill effects of using chemicals excessively in agriculture and stressed on ecologically sound alternatives while backing a recent government draft order to prohibit a bunch of pesticides. Civil society members, citing risks, threats and damage from 27 pesticides, came out in support of a May 14,...

-The Tribune The Government on Wednesday announced three "major agriculture reforms" for farmers, including an Ordinance to promote “barrier-free inter-state and intra-state trade outside APMC market” and amendment to the Essential Commodities Act., removing commodities like cereals, pulses oilseeds edible oils onion and potatoes from list of essential commodities. Briefing about the three reforms after the Cabinet headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi made the decisions, Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar called...

-The Tribune Proposed Bill needs to make the industry pay for health damages AMIDST a hurricane of lawsuits that agrochemical multinational Bayer-Monsanto faces in the US and elsewhere over its herbicides Roundup and Dicamba’s alleged link to cancer, a joint investigation by Unearthed, a journalists’ research group founded by Swiss NGO Public Eye and Greenpeace UK, found that India tops the global chart with nearly 59 per cent of the sales being...