-The New Indian Express The financial distress in the rural sector, especially borne by the farmers and reflected in farmer suicides, is a matter of concern for the nation. The rural economy housing nearly two-thirds of the population is vital for the development of the nation as it not only supplies food for consumption but also provides a market for industrial output. The rural people, due to lack of awareness of...

-ANI Greening the barren land in Jharkhand and West Bengal Deoghar: Standing amid the road in Kasuadi village in Jharkhand, Deevani Mahato looks intently towards the contrasting landscape stretching across on both sides of the road. Wet green fields of wheat, mustard and grams, separated by the bunds of mud, cover the land on one side. Barren tracts of red soil full of dry bushes and stones stretch on the other. "By next...

-ANI Chennai: Indian agriculture is at the cross roads, Dr. M.S. Swaminathan, father of India's first Green Revolution, has warned. Lamenting on the state of Indian farmers, especially farmers with small land-holdings, Dr. Swaminathan said, "The market economy certainly is not friendly to small farmers. WTO regulations are also hindrance. Even in the United States which is the heartland of the free market economy, farmers are insulated from market shocks through heavy...

-India Today Ahmedabad: IIT-Madras graduate Kannan Lakshminarayan dusted a few copies of "Young India" to find Mahatma Gandhi's vision and initiate cotton farmers to use miniature spinning machines right in their village where they grow the crop and increase their income. Following this, the middleman was out, the long-drawn value chain was short-circuited while farmers became spinners first and subsequently, weavers and even garment makers. In 1920, Mahatma Gandhi had written in...

-IPS News NAYAGARH (IPS): Kama Pradhan, a 35-year-old tribal woman, her eyes intent on the glowing screen of a hand-held GPS device, moves quickly between the trees. Ahead of her, a group of men hastens to clear away the brambles from stone pillars that stand at scattered intervals throughout this dense forest in the Nayagarh district of India’s eastern Odisha state. The heavy stone markers, laid down by the British 150 years...