KOCHI: In a rare move, the Union government has launched an ‘Appeal to the People of Kerala’ advertisement campaign to counter the ‘false propaganda’ against the Indo-ASEAN free trade agreement (FTA). Rarely does the Centre come out with such State-specific advertisement campaigns to counter resistance to its policy, it is pointed out. The half-page ads in the newspapers, issued in ‘public interest’ by the Union Ministry of Commerce and Industry, is...

The draft agreement being discussed ahead of December’s crucial Copenhagen summit is long, confusing and contradictory.  It is a blueprint to save the world. And yet it is long, confusing and contradictory. Negotiators have released a draft version of a new global agreement on climate change, which is widely billed as the last chance to save the planet from the ravages of global warming. Running to some 200 pages, the...

The Centre has approved the first legally tenable import of electronic waste for responsible recycling, angering environmental groups who say millions of kilograms of domestic e-waste is recycled hazardously. The environment and forest ministry has approved the import of 8,000 tonnes of e-waste by Attero Recycling, a company that has set up an integrated recycling plant for safe extraction of metals near Roorkee. India generates nearly 400,000 tonnes of domestic...

There has been an animated debate in the past three years over the supply of food in the ICDS (Integrated Child Development Services) programme. Supplementary nutrition has been provided to all children under the age of six since the inception of the programme more than three decades ago. This was done with the recognition that the nutrition gap (between what children should be consuming every day and what they actually...

Southern Kerala state is known for the lush expanses of cardamom, pepper, tea and rubber that grow on its misty hills, and the bountiful catches of fish on a coastline punctuated by lagoons and backwaters. But a cloud in the form of a a free trade deal with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) bloc hovers over this picture of plenty. With the Indo-ASEAN Free Trade Agreement (FTA) now...