In a few days from now, women could account for 52 per cent of all local bodies. They are tailors, farmers, accountants, legal clerks, homemakers, vendors and activists. There are M.Com degree holders alongside poor women from deprived backgrounds. Together, they make up the most highly educated women candidates fighting local body elections anywhere in the country. There are nearly 40,000 of them contesting the polls across more than 1,200...

Rice exporters from India are upbeat over the higher projections of basmati output and better prospects of exports. The loss of crop, in Philippines due to storms and in Thailand and Pakistan due to floods, is driving Indian exporters to speculate for better realisations this year. The satellite image procured by All India Rice Millers Association and Agriculture and Processed Food Products Exports Development Authority (APEDA) depict an increase in area under...

The government on Wednesday hiked the sugar production estimate for the 2010-11 marketing year (October-September) to 24.5 million tonnes (mt) from 23 mt earlier. "This will be the best year in terms of sugar production and productivity... The production this year will be in the range of 24-24.5 million tonnes," food, PDS and civil supplies minister Sharad Pawar said. The current government estimate is virtually on par with that of the...

Enhanced food grains production and productivity in general, and in rain-fed areas in particular, would pave the way for an autonomous, decentralised PDS which should be the goal of public policy in India's march to food and nutrition security, the former secretary said. "We need to build on some of the existing programmes through an appropriate strategy for increased agricultural production, with a new emphasis on dryland agriculture," Venugopal said....

Asia Pacific nations agreed on Sunday to boost the region’s agricultural productivity through technology transfer and information sharing as climate change and a fall in arable land threaten future food supplies. The 21-member countries of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) also called for “responsible” agricultural investment as rising acquisition of farmland in developing countries by other nations to ensure their own food supplies is causing friction with local people. “Climate change...