-Scroll.in With climate change, farmer suicides and agicultural distress, the drought-resilient coarse grain that requires few resources could be the answer. Already caught in a vicious cycle of debt and declining yields, Indian farmers now face new challenges from climate change. The Ministry of Earth Science, in a 2020 report, predicts, “Rising temperatures, heat extremes, and increasing year-to-year rainfall variability are likely to adversely impact crop yield.” India’s Green Revolution of the 1960s...

The transport sector is important for the smooth functioning of an economy. The supply chains for various products and by-products (both domestically as well as internationally) can work efficiently only if the transportation of raw materials and inputs, and final goods and commodities takes place without disruption.   Due to economic growth, India’s annual CO2 (i.e., carbon dioxide) emission has expanded from 1.19 billion tonnes in 2005 to 2.44 billion tonnes...

-Gaon Connection Birsa Harit Gram Yojana, launched in 2020 as a rural employment scheme, in convergence with the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, is providing double benefits to farmers who are cultivating their fallow lands and also earning wages. Barabanki (East Singhbhum), Jharkhand: For a large part of the year, 51-year-old Laxmi Narayan Singh's three acre plot of land used to remain fallow. He and his 46-year-old wife Savita Singh...

-The Hindu Business Line MSP signalling in favour of oilseeds, pulses should be backed up by credible procurement steps In announcing the minimum support prices for the kharif season, the Centre has rightly stuck to its plan of trying to wean away acreage from rice, particularly in rainfed areas, to pulses and oilseeds. This has been its policy since 2015, and it has resulted in output gains and increased acreage in pulses,...

-Down to Earth Low returns and high risks from alternative crops among reasons past efforts failed, says report The Commission for Agricultural Cost and Prices (CACP) has recommended promotion of crop diversification, favouring oilseed crops amid the global inflation in oilseeds and vegetable oils prices. Global inflation creates a structural risk as vegetable oils account for about half of India’s agricultural import, subsequently raising the country’s agri-import bill, the commission wrote in its...