-The Indian Express Farmer unions need to expand the scope of their advocacy. Every day, a gold miner in Russia leaves a mine with a wheelbarrow full of sand. Every day, the guard thoroughly checks the sand. On his retirement day, the guard asks the worker, “I know you have been stealing something, but can’t figure out what it is”. The worker whispers back, “I wasn’t hiding anything in the sand,...

-Financial Express A study by ICRIER researchers Ashok Gulati and Pritha Banerjee shows how problematic the fertiliser policy is—for farmers, industry, the environment and the government. India’s experience with fertilisers, in the later part of the Green Revolution, prompted it to adopt a policy of subsidising fertilisers. In 1977, the country had a total NPK (nitrogenous, phosphatic and potassic) fertiliser consumption of 4.3 million metric tonnes (mmt) and per hectare usage...

-The Hindu Business Line The proposals relating to registration of seed varieties and powers granted to the government to fix prices in some situations need a relook Seed is the primary input of a productive agriculture set-up. No one can deny the fact that the seed industry has been at the centre of the significant advances made in agriculture in the last four decades and will continue to do in the years...

-The Economic Times Indian farmer's plight has changed little even under GST that aims to revolutionise all kinds of businesses. NEW DELHI: That the farmer has historically had one of the most unrewarding and thankless jobs in India is fairly common knowledge. Data sets after data sets show how Indian farmers have remained hopelessly caught between ineffective policy and equally ineffective implementation — through the Five-Year-Plans era, through successive governments, and through...

-Down to Earth Although the actual amount of fines charged was not available; farmers continue to burn residues every season Crop residue burning in Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh has been known, but nowadays it's spreading more frequently in other parts of country. Wheat stubble burning is a relatively new issue which started with mechanised harvesting using combine harvesters. In the last four to five years, farmers from UP’s Ghazipur district, especially...