-The Indian Express Between September and December, when retail onion prices soared from around Rs 30 to Rs 100-plus per kg (they have since fallen to Rs 50 or so), Paswan has similarly urged state governments through Twitter to “act” against alleged hoarders of the bulb. On January 7, Union Consumer Affairs minister Ram Vilas Paswan took to Twitter, to issue a stern warning to “hoarders”, whom he blamed for “creating artificial...

-The Hindu Business Line The maximum crop damage was reported from Western Madhya Pradesh, which received 61 per cent surplus rains. Excess monsoon rains and the floods caused by them affected crops in many States, including Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka and Punjab, according to a kharif crop damage report released by private weather forecaster Skymet on Tuesday.   While 40 to 50 per cent of soyabean crop has been hit in Madhya...

-The Indian Express Soyabean, which covers around 5.34 lh of area in the region, is being cultivated more recently, said Ashok Bhutada of the Kirti Group. Of the 70 lakh hectares (lh) of cultivated area in Marathwada, sugarcane is grown over only 2 lh. In contrast, pulses and oilseeds have a bigger share, with farmers growing them over 11.37 lh and 13.11 lh respectively. The sugar sector in the state, however,...

-The Hindu Business Line ‘Switch to modern production systems has led to decline in use of farmers’ varieties and landraces’ As few as nine crops account for two-thirds of the global food output, and on-farm crop diversity has declined significantly over the decades as farmers have switched from traditional production systems that utilise farmers’ varieties and landraces to modern production systems depending on officially released varieties, shows a report on global biodiversity...

-The Indian Express The unprecedented procurement of pulses and oilseeds in the last couple of years has created problems — and opportunities. If there’s one area in agriculture where the Narendra Modi government has probably broken fresh ground, it is in the procurement of pulses and oilseeds.   During the 2016-17 and 2017-18 agricultural years (July-June), the Central agencies — National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India (Nafed), Small Farmers’ Agribusiness Consortium (SFAC)...