-The Hindu Business Line Two crore hectares of land affected in these States, says Agriculture Ministry Pune: Maharashtra and Karnataka are facing a severe drought this year, according to data from the Union Ministry of Agriculture. Twenty-four out of 30 districts (80 per cent) in Karnataka and 26 out of 36 districts (72 per cent) in Maharashtra are reeling under water scarcity and crop failure. Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand, Gujarat and Rajasthan have also...

-Down to Earth While other states had declared drought months ago, Gujarat govt kept calling it a “scarcity of water” While other states like Karnataka, Maharshtra, Odisha, Jharkhand, Bihar and Andhra Pradesh had declared drought at the very offset of the southwest monsoon, and began work on mitigation measures, the Gujarat government remained silent despite receiving deficit rainfall in most of the districts. Until yesterday, the Gujarat government had been terming the situation...

-The Hindu Japanese officials met farmers over land acquisition Ahmedabad: Officials of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), which is funding the Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train project, have apparently found violations of the agency’s guidelines in the process of land acquisition. The officials held a series of meetings with farmers and their representatives and also activists, who are opposing land acquisition for bullet train project. According to sources, a team of JICA officials is now...

-The Economic Times NEW DELHI: The prime minister’s pet scheme to ensure higher income for farmers through robust procurement in coordination with states is moving at a snail’s pace, with just about 11% of the target achieved in the first two months, officials said. Food Corporation of India (FCI) and National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd (Nafed), which have a target to procure 33 lakh tonne of oilseeds and pulses...

Just a few days ahead of the Kisan Mukti March in Delhi NCR, the provisional results of the Agriculture Census 2015-16 became available in the public domain. The report, among other things, highlights the long-term problems affecting Indian agriculture including fragmentation of land holdings (particularly the marginal and small ones) and shrinking average size of farm land. The provisional results of the latest Agriculture Census reveal that at the national level...