India’s vital monsoon rains revived in the soybean-growing central region on Thursday, after a two-week lag that reduced June rainfall to 16% below normal, the second lowest in 15 years. Heavy showers in the central Madhya Pradesh state would accelerate soybean planting in the world’s top importer of edible oils and ease growing nervousness about monsoon rains. The weather office reaffirmed its prediction of a normal monsoon this year, in line with...

A significant proportion of the country’s official below poverty line (BPL) population cannot be termed ‘poor’. Fathom this: around a fourth of the 14 million odd BPL households in urban India own a two-wheeler, a third of them a colour TV and almost two-third a pressure cooker. Almost one in five urban BPL households has at least one well-educated, graduate or above, member. The 56 million-strong rural BPL population too exhibits...

The National Advisory Council (NAC), headed by UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, will consider ways to boost Indian agriculture as part of its drive to review the draft food security bill on July 1. “The NAC will address the sorry state of Indian agriculture, which recorded negative (-2 per cent) growth in 2010, and try to find ways to boost it in the long term,” said an NAC member. “The idea is...

Shortfall in sowing of paddy, pulses and coarse cereals Union Agriculture Ministry officials are keeping their fingers crossed for the southwest monsoon to revive in parts of northern and central India before putting in place a contingency plan for kharif (paddy) sowing. So far there has been a shortfall in sowing of paddy, pulses and coarse cereals compared to last year, which was a drought year, resulting in a kharif output deficit...

Furious debates among policymakers about the proposed national food security law largely revolve around its financial repercussions. The Planning Commission is finally coming around to accepting the Tendulkar Committee’s estimates of 37.2 per cent BPL population or 8.5 crore BPL households. The fiscal burden in implementing the food security law for 37.5 per cent BPL population, with each household being provided 35 kg food grains, is estimated to be Rs...