-The Indian Express Agriculture Ministry’s harvest estimates don’t square with drought conditions in several cases, raise serious questions of credibility. We have had two consecutive drought years, yet India’s milk production, according to the Agriculture Ministry, has risen from 137.69 million tonnes (mt) in 2013-14 to 146.31 mt in 2014-15 and 160.35 mt in 2015-16. Never before has the country’s milk output grown at these rates — that too, in the face...
More »SEARCH RESULT
From Plate to Plough: Twenty-five years of tinkering -Ashok Gulati
-The Indian Express Agriculture needs a champion in the Union cabinet. July, this year, marks the silver jubilee of economic reforms. It is time to take stock of our major successes and failures. There is a saying that bad times are often good for policies and good times are bad for policies. It is well-known that the foreign exchange crisis, with reserves falling to as low as $1.5 billion, triggered fundamental changes...
More »Labelling to take the pinch out of salt -R Prasad
-The Hindu If regulation goes to plan, the Indian consumer will no longer be in the dark about sodium content in food products. Indian adults consume between 8.5 grams and 15 grams of salt each day as against the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) recommendation of less than 5 grams per day to reduce blood pressure, heart disease and stroke, says a September 2012 paper in PLOS ONE. According to the President of the...
More »Govt hints at lower hikes in support prices for farmers -Zia Haq
-Hindustan Times The government could move away from large hikes in support prices for farmers, agriculture minister Radha Mohan Singh hinted on Wednesday, signalling a key farm policy shift aimed at rationalising subsidies and taming inflation. The minister said some people thought the “only way to shore up farmer income is through minimum support prices”. “Wrong. This alone won’t do unless farmers diversify their activities into livestock, kitchen gardens, fishery etc. That’s our...
More »Javadekar does a U-turn after questioning pollution study -Jacob Koshy
-The Hindu In an unusual sequence of events around a research paper that claimed air pollution was responsible for reducing life expectancy in Delhi by six years, Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar not only condemned the study but said in an e-mailed public statement that “the timing of the release of the study seems to be motivated as it has been done at a time when Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi is...
More »