-IPS News MALKANGIRI (Odisha)- Scattered across 31 remote hilltop villages on a mountain range that towers 1,500 to 4,000 feet above sea level, in the Malkangiri district of India's eastern Odisha state, the Upper Bonda people are considered one of this country's most ancient tribes, having barely altered their lifestyle in over a thousand years. Resistant to contact with the outside world and fiercely skeptical of modern development, this community of under...

-The Hindustan Times The entire framework for monitoring environmental compliance is being dismantled systematically. This is a process that actually began with the UPA government, which replaced the feisty environment minister Jairam Ramesh with the more pliant Jayanthi Natarajan. With industry lobbies still crying wolf, she too made way for Veerappa Moily, the petroleum and natural gas minister, without the UPA seeing anything contradictory in someone holding both those responsibilities. In just a month,...

-Financial Chronicle The United Nations declared 2014 as the International Year of Family Farming (IYFF) to recognise the importance of family farming in reducing poverty and improving global food security. According to the UN, the IYFF aims to promote new development policies at national and regional levels that will help small holder and family farmers eradicate hunger through small scale sustainable agricultural production. Family farming involves about 500 million families consisting...

-The Economic Times Last month, union tribal Minister Jual Oram told the Lok Sabha that India is making "satisfactory progress" implementing the " Forest Rights Act" (FRA). However, a closer look at the numbers he submitted in the house indicates otherwise. The FRA is one of the three rights-based legislations passed by UPA1 -- along with the National Rural Employment Guarentee Act (NREGA) and the Right to Information ( RTI) Act. It...

-The Times of India NAGPUR: With Maharashtra losing 14 sqkm forest cover due to encroachments as per the latest 'India State of Forest Report (ISFR) 2013', green activists have attributed the dwindling green cover to massive encroachments on forest land done to get permanent pattas under the Forest Rights Act (FRA) 2006. The fact is revealed by ISFR 2013 that states that Maharashtra lost 25 sq km in 12 tribal districts since...