Two of the three Bengal agencies tasked with procuring paddy directly from farmers have failed to do so till now because of lack of funds, a revelation that blunts the state government’s attempt to blame the Centre. Paddy procurement is one of the purported issues over which the Congress and the Trinamul Congress have been calling each other names. The state government had pointed fingers at the Centre-run Food Corporation of...
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Record grain output in 2011 facilitates Bill
-PTI The agriculture sector performed exceedingly well in 2011, with record grain production of over 240 million tonnes giving enough leeway for the government to lift a ban on exports of wheat and non-basmati rice and introduce the food security bill in Parliament. Farmers’ long-standing demand for crop loans at a 4% rate of interest was met during the year, although with a rider that the facility would be available to...
More »Food Security Bill likely to hurt the poor more
-The Economic Times The Food Security Bill cleared by the Cabinet is likely to hurt the poor more than it helps them. India already has 54.7 million tonnes of rice and wheat lying as stocks with the Centre and the states, 29.7 million tonnes of grain in excess of the buffer stocking norm. Offtake of rice in the current fiscal year has been 74% of the allotment, and that of wheat,...
More »Food prices remain steady during November, UN agency reports
-The United Nations Global food prices in November were virtually unchanged from October, and 10 per cent below their peak in February, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reported today. FAO’s Food Price Index level was 215 points last month – just two points, or one per cent, above its level in November 2010, according to a news release issued by the Rome-based agency. Cereal prices dropped by 3 points, or...
More »Reviving Universal PDS: A Step Towards Food Security by Suranjita Ray
An unprecedented economic growth during the last decade has also seen increasing malnutrition, hunger and starvation amongst certain sections of society. India ranks 66 in the Food and Agriculture Organisation’s (FAO’s) World Hunger Index of 88 countries (Inter-national Food Policy Research Institute). More than 200 million people in this country are denied the right to food. One-third of all underweight children (57 million) in the world due to lack of...
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