-The Hindu Business Line One sector in which the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) can claim some success during its 10 years in power is agriculture. Between 2003-04 and 2013-14, India's foodgrain output rose from 213.19 million tonnes (mt) to 263.20 mt. Production of pulses and oilseeds has also gone up from under 15 and 25 mt to nearly 20 and 33 mt respectively, after registering near stagnation in the previous decade....

-The Hindustan Times New Delhi: Vegetable prices are likely to rise this week as wholesalers across the board have gone on strike protesting the Delhi government's decision to stop the 6% commission charged by distributors from farmers. Retailers in the city stated that even though they were selling at the previous rates on Monday, they would be forced to charge higher prices or not sell at all from Tuesday owing to the...

-The Business Standard The challenge to anti-inflation policy lies in better institutions and better evidence-based policy Our failure to rein in inflation has been costly. Economically, it has hurt growth. Poor and urban middle-class households have been affected the most. A combination of slowing growth and high inflation has weakened our macro-fundamentals: households fled financial savings, domestic and foreign investors lost confidence, and the rupee plunged. Politically, it has been a disaster. For...

-Economic and Political Weekly Price spikes in onion in 2010 and 2013 brought little benefi t to farmers. It is the big traders who manage to maintain high stocks that make a killing in times of sudden price rise. The government's solutions to such problems have only resulted in the further deterioration of wholesale agricultural markets in many states. Kannan Kasturi (kasturi_kannan@yahoo.com) is an independent researcher and writes on public interest and...

-The Business Standard The Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee law allows mandis to remain in the grip of a middlemen cartel, with clear links to politicians who run the governments Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi has, in effect, told chief ministers of party-ruled states that if food inflation is to be controlled, as many items as possible must be got out of the purview of the Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) Act. For the time...