Complexity and unsolved problems are at the very heart of the sustainability challenge, and at the very heart of M.S. Swaminathan's thinking and essays. In 1798, Thomas Robert Malthus offered the piercing insight that geometric population growth would inevitably outstrip food production, leaving society destitute and hungry. Since that time, our optimism of beating the “Malthusian curse” has waxed and waned. Few people in modern history have done more to help...
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Half of India’s population lives below the poverty line by Arun Kumar
According to a new Oxford University study, 55 percent of India’s population of 1.1 billion, or 645 million people, are living in poverty. Using a newly-developed index, the study found that about one-third of the world’s poor live in India. The Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) has been developed by the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) as a more precise and comprehensive means of...
More »Subsidised wheat, rice to 1.5 cr more BPL families from Oct 2
The government is likely to provide subsidised wheat and rice to 1.5 crore additional BPL families from October 2, Food and Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar told the Rajya Sabha on Friday. Replying to supplementaries during Question Hour, he said the Planning Commission will give the revised number of people living below poverty line (BPL) in a month's time. The revision is being done based on the parameter decided by the...
More »Can Organic Farming "Feed the World"? by Christos Vasilikiotis
The legacy of Industrial Agriculture With the world population passing the 6 billion mark last October, the debate over our ability to sustain a fast growing population is heating up. Biotechnology advocates in particular are becoming very vocal in their claim that there is no alternative to using genetically modified crops in agriculture if "we want to feed the world". Actually, that quote might be true. It depends what they mean...
More »No More Excuses To Eliminating Child Labour by Ananthapriya Subramanian
What do three members of the National Advisory Council, two members of the Planning Commission, Editors (including the editor and executive editor of this magazine), MPs from across the political spectrum, CII members and the NCPCR have in common? One single demand: no child under 14 should be engaged in child labour. Forty-five eminent members of society from very diverse backgrounds have thrown their considerable weight behind an ongoing campaign...
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