-Firstpost.com Ludhiana: North India’s smog problem — a cause of much tension between states — seems to have left politicians, farmers and even experts stumped. In Punjab, the government’s measures to tackle stubble-burning have reaped little dividend, as the farmers, many of them debt-ridden, say that at the end of the harvesting season, they are still left with no option but to set paddy straw on fire in order to clear their...

  How clean are our rivers? Latest data indicates a negative trend.  A report by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), which was released in September this year, reveals that in total there were 45 river stretches across the country in 2016-17, where water quality is found to be the worst. In 2014-15, however, the total number of such river stretches was just 34. Technically speaking, the value of biochemical oxygen demand...

-The Hindu Business Line Also moots farming of GM species in closed systems Kochi: A draft national policy on mariculture has mooted mariculture zones by demarcating special areas in the sea for activities such as cage farming, bivalve farming, pen culture, seaweed culture, hatcheries and nurseries based on scientific criteria. The draft policy was formulated by an expert committee formed by the National Fisheries Development Board (NFDB) with A Gopalakrishnan, Director of Central...

-The Telegraph Bid to help poor who lost cattle in floods A Kerala district has devised a programme under which people are being requested to donate cows to the poor who lost their cattle in the recent floods and landslides. The hill district of Wayanad, which recorded the death of 223 cows during the calamity, has come up with the Donate a Cow programme, under which the administration will rebuild the livelihoods of...

-The Indian Express The impact on the labour force was even much more significant. While the job losses could have been at least 3.5 million, the reduction in the labour force was to the tune of 15 million. New Delhi: Demonetisation may have caused job losses of at least 3.5 million and the damaging impact on labour force was even starker, Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) chief executive Mahesh Vyas said...