-Hindustan Times Farming must become sustainable since agriculturists are struggling to build resilience against many threats I spent international women’s day in Mangalagiri, in Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh, with Usha Rani. As a single mother for 17 years, she has raised two children (now in second-year college and in high school). Three years ago, she switched to natural farming. On less than half an acre, she practises multicropping, growing maize, banana,...

-VillageSquare.in Income support to smallholder farmers is similar to palliative measures like minimum support prices or loan waivers that do not address the problem of an unsustainable population living on a fixed resource base The government in the budget for this year has announced an allocation of Rs 75,000 crore for direct income transfer of Rs 6,000 annually for every farmer who owns less than 2 hectares of land. This amount...

-The Indian Express Fall in emigration, and reverse migration from the Gulf, challenge Kerala’s welfare model. The state must find a way Migration trends indicate that the Gulf, which had long funded the Kerala development story, may soon turn out to be a headache if not a nightmare. Economic slowdown in the Gulf countries, state policies favouring replacement of migrants with local labour, influx of workers from Africa and countries such...

-TheWire.in With respect to agriculture, a lot of data is either not available or is released with delay. Often, it is inconsistent with other data sets. At the recent Vibrant Gujarat summit, Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani said, “In this new world, data is the new Oil. And data is the new wealth. India’s data must be controlled and owned by Indian people and not by corporates, especially global corporations.” The data of...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Womenfolk in seven crore poor households no longer have to suffer smoky kitchens, thanks to the blistering pace at which the Narendra Modi government has rolled out its ‘Ujjwala’ scheme to provide free LPG connection to economically weaker families. Some 82% of these beneficiary households are returning for a refill as the transformational energy programme takes root, deepening the Modi government’s political outreach among the poor...