-The Hindu Odisha misses degraded patches, thus plantation target missed, says CAG The Comptroller and Auditor General of India has found concentration of plantation activities in easily accessible areas like land along the pathways, leaving the degraded patches in the middle of dense forest unplanted in Odisha — one of reasons cited for missing plantation target in the State. The CAG came down heavily on the State government indicating that plantation undertaken by...

-Down to Earth Dry June led to late paddy transplantation; More than half of targetted acreage lie uncultivated     A dry June followed by a rainy July might delay Kharif crops in Odisha this monsoon. Farmers in several districts, mainly the western and coastal areas, have yet to start paddy transplantation due to erratic rainfall. Through July 23, paddy was sown in 1.27 million hectares out of 3.5 million hectares planned by...

-Newsclick.in SKM leaders Darshan Pal and Yogendra Yadav have outrightly rejected the committee. The Central government's decision to exclude Punjab institutions and state government representations from a committee on agricultural issues has been called out by farmer leaders. The committee, headed by former agriculture secretary Sanjay Agrawal, will have 26 members, including farmer representatives, agri-scientists and agri-economists, as well as officials from Central and state governments, a notification issued by the Ministry of...

-Down to Earth NFSA’s implementation through TPDS has not been uniform in the country, according to Centre The Government of India July 5, 2022, came up with a first-ever state ranking index to capture the implementation of the Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS) under the National Food Security Act (NFSA). Odisha topped the list of 34 states and Union territories (UTs).  Ladakh was ranked last on the index. In fact, nine of the...

-Down to Earth In a warming world, governments are far from prepared to resettle people evicted by sea-level rise  Bay of Bengal is the hotbed of tropical cyclones. Estimates show that eight of the 10 deadliest tropical cyclones in the world have originated here. Over the past few decades, cyclones in Bay of Bengal have not only become frequent, the region is also experiencing the largest relative increase of flood risk and...