-Down to Earth Low returns and high risks from alternative crops among reasons past efforts failed, says report The Commission for Agricultural Cost and Prices (CACP) has recommended promotion of crop diversification, favouring oilseed crops amid the global inflation in oilseeds and vegetable oils prices. Global inflation creates a structural risk as vegetable oils account for about half of India’s agricultural Import, subsequently raising the country’s agri-Import bill, the commission wrote in its...

-TheWire.in This year, India is ranked lowest, at 180. Kochi: India ranked lowest – 180 – in the recently released Environment Performance Index (EPI), 2022, which lists countries based on several performance indicators, such as environmental health. The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) rejected the country’s EPI ranking on June 8, alleging that the Index is based on “surmises and unscientific methods”. In a press release, the Union environment ministry listed...

-TheWire.in A Tata Nano pays the same toll to go from Mumbai and Pune on the expressway as does a Rolls Royce. Why should pharmaceutical products be any different? On May 26, amid news reports about yet another closed-door meeting that the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) had had with unspecified stakeholders, we were reminded of an interesting press release that the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilisers had issued in July 2021. The...

-United Nations News Countries are expected to spend a staggering $1.8 trillion Importing food they need this year; this would be a new world record but worryingly, it’s going to buy them less food, not more. That’s according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) which on Thursday suggested that for some countries, the situation potentially heralded “an end of their resilience to higher prices”. Ever-higher fixed costs for farmers of so-called...

-The Hindu Business Line They have shown the way in water conservation, waste management and solar energy Be it climate change adaptation or mitigation, cooperatives have set the agenda to collectively provide solutions to the looming impact of rising temperature, loss of jobs, depletion of water resources, degradation of land and forest resources and accumulation of wastes leading to health hazards. The explicit adoption of eco-social agendas by cooperatives is contributing to co-op...