Dr MS Swaminathan, NAC member and the father of India's green revolution talks to Rupashree Nanda on the food security legislation, the neglect in creating storage infrastructure and ideas like outsourcing food security issues. Rupashree Nanda: The main reason for the NAC climb down from the promised universal PDS to targeted PDS was the stated non - availability of foodgrains. Would you agree to that argument? Isn't there is not enough...

A fast growing economy is a thirsty economy and India is no exception—with the country’s water supply already under great strain, India must reassess its consumption to meet escalating demands for water to produce food and energy. Business-as-usual water practices cannot remain the same in India as the economy and its demand for freshwater grows over the coming decades. With an astounding 75% of freshwater already used for agriculture in India,...

There is a shortage of non-Bt seeds, and traditional seeds are contaminated Tests on cotton seeds available in the market show that they are contaminated Agriculture officials confirm the near absence of traditional variety of cotton seeds Karnataka may soon fall off the organic cotton map owing to shortage of non-Bt cotton seeds and contamination of traditional seeds. As a result, a major organic cotton belt such as H.D. Kote in Mysore district may...

India's power revolution seems to have run out of steam due to transmission and distribution losses. The country is losing a huge quota of power to faulty distribution networks and power theft every year. The losses, experts say, are currently 29 %of the total generation, which equals a shocking Rs 45,000 crore in the fiscal year 2009-10 . The drop in losses since 2001 is a negligible 3% . President...

Economists’ report says tractors are used for just 178 hrs a year and electric motors are overused That Punjab faces an acute labour shortage each paddy season is a known and established fact. But not many know that 48.66 per cent of the total ‘family labour’ — members of a farmer’s family — available for agriculture remains underutilised in the state. A study of the resources employed in Punjab agriculture throws up...