-Livemint.com Healthy, living soil is the most essential element in ensuring food security. Yet it is often ignored by policy planners The global population, which stood at 6.1 billion in 2000, is estimated to reach 8.5 billion by 2030 and 9.7 billion in 2050. India has 2.4% of the world’s arable land and more than 17% of the global population. Meeting the demand for fibre and food to feed this growing population...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: An analysis of hunger levels worldwide released today has ranked India 97 among 118 countries with one in three children in the country facing stunted growth and 15 per cent of the population undernourished from lack of food. The Global Hunger Index 2016, an assessment by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), has placed India behind Bangladesh, Nigeria and Rwanda and just ahead of North Korea in...

-The Indian Express Inclusive agricultural growth is key to removing poverty by 2030. Eradicating poverty from the planet was the top-most target in a set of 17 goals adopted by the UN last September as a part of its sustainable development agenda. Nations across the globe, including India, endorsed it. The strategies to achieve this goal have been left open to countries. In this context, the Rural Development Report (RDR) 2016 of...

-Livemint.com Pulses are important from the perspectives of food security, environmental sustainability and balanced nutrition Most pulses such as pigeon pea (tur dal), black gram (urad), green gram (mung), field beans (waal), moth beans (matki) and horse gram (kulith) are native to the Indian subcontinent and have been an integral part of our diet for centuries. However, the single-minded focus on cereals over the last 50 years—the green revolution in wheat and...

-The Hindu Business Line New Delhi: India has sought the cooperation of fellow BRICS members — Brazil, Russia, China and South Africa — to help meet the country’s production shortfall in pulses and oilseeds. Agriculture Ministers from BRICS countries have agreed to promote production of pulses in their respective countries and raise awareness about its nutritional aspects, according to the joint declaration adopted at the end of their meeting in New Delhi,...