-CaravanMagazine.in Farmers suffer under the coronavirus lockdown At the beginning of this year, things looked good for Indian farmers. As per advance estimates of the agriculture ministry, the country was expected to produce a record 106.21 million tonnes of wheat in 2019–20, 2.61 million tonnes more than what was produced the previous year. This increase was mainly attributed to increased acreage under wheat production and optimum soil moisture on account of a...

Most reports and studies by official agencies, international think tanks and private entities indicate the cataclysmic impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the economy and society. They anticipate that lockdowns imposed by various countries across the globe to reduce the exponential diffusion of COVID-19 (i.e. for flattening the curve by social distancing and quarantines) would adversely affect economic growth and disrupt supply chains in most sectors, on top of causing...

-The Hindu Business Line New Delhi: Resorting to conservation agriculture would not only increase crop yield, income and reduce the use of natural resources, but would also confer climate change benefits, according to a study by Indian agricultural scientists and others published in an international journal on Thursday. The study, published in the journal Nature Sustainability, also showed that conservation agriculture was key to meeting many of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals...

-The Indian Express Home Ministry New Lockdown Guidelines: Under the revised guidelines, a list of things that is allowed during the extended nationwide lockdown till May 3 Home Ministry New Lockdown Guidelines: A day after extending the lockdown to May 3, the government Wednesday released revised guidelines under which activities like agriculture, Information Technology, e-commerce and movement of trucks and goods carriers will be allowed from April 20 to “mitigate hardships to...

-The Indian Express According to the 2011 census, 3.5 million migrants who moved within the last one year stated economic reasons for migration. The corresponding numbers for the 2001 and 1991 census, were, respectively, 2.2 and 1.4 million. The COVID-19 crisis is affecting rural India at a time when agriculture is already in a precarious situation. The thousands of migrant workers who have returned to their villages since the lockdown used to...