The Labour Bureau recently released its first report on employment in the country. Till now, job estimates have usually been available in the employment-unemployment surveys of the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO). The most recent of these is the 64th round (2007-08), preliminary results of which were reported in this column on 20 July. The 64th round estimates were disappointing, with annual employment growth during 2004-05 and 2007-08 at 0.8...

Global agriculture contributes in the region of 17 percent to the greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change, but according to the World Bank, climate smart agriculture techniques can both reduce emissions and meet the challenge of producing enough food for a growing world population."As much as agriculture is part of the problem, it is also part of the solution," said Inger Anderson, the World Bank's vice president on sustainable...

Italy, the United States, Greece, Belgium and the United Kingdom top a list of two dozen developed countries that let their most vulnerable children fall even further behind, with enormous consequences not only for the youngsters themselves but for the economy and society at large, according to a new United Nations report released today.“As debates rage on austerity measures and social spending cuts, the report focuses on the hundreds of...

A death threat to a historic 13-year-old international treaty on climate change that surfaced last year appears to have intensified and may stall progress at the UN climate change talks here in this scenic Mexican city. Several industrialised countries are opposing the continuation of the Kyoto Protocol, the 1997 treaty that had set legally binding targets only on industrialised countries for the reduction of emissions of greenhouse gases up to the...

A new food security report for Asia has been launched in Mumbai by The International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and the Asia Society, calling for increased investment in rice research. The report, Never an empty bowl: sustaining food security in Asia, emphasizes the importance of rice as the primary staple food in Asia and a major source of income for Asian farmers. It also recommends more research on: climate change mitigation for...