-The Hindu Business Line Overuse of groundwater, fertiliser and energy threatens the future of agriculture. A coherent policy response is called for India's agricultural sector is far more important to the country than its falling share in the GDP suggests. About two-thirds of India's population depends on agriculture for livelihood. Bucking global trends, the agricultural population in India rose by 50 per cent between 1980 and 2011. And in spite of sustained...

-Frontline Outcomes of the patterns of growth induced by neoliberal economic reforms have increased the disproportionality between agricultural and non-agricultural growth, and with costs rising and prices not keeping pace, agriculture is becoming increasingly unviable. FARMERS across northern and central India-in Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana and elsewhere-are distressed. Unseasonal rains have damaged their standing crop and help from the government has been meagre and slow in coming. This, however, is...

-The Financial Express In a column in The Financial Express, ("Time to tweak priority-sector lending", goo.gl/6O8AOL, February 6), the author made a case for "tweaking" priority-sector lending (PSL) norms which largely stipulate that the commercial banks direct credit towards certain vulnerable sectors and target population. Specifically, the article argued for revisiting the sectoral targets and cited a reduction in the share of agriculture sector in GDP as a valid reason...

-Business Standard Marriages on hold, children being returned from schools over unpaid fees; the rural economy is bearing the brunt of unseasonal rains, a crisis in the sugar cane sector and a fall in prices of farm pro Hapur/ Meerut: In the mid-afternoon, when most farmers are returning home to rest, Rana Ranjit Singh is sweating buckets on his farm in Uttar Pradesh's Hapur district, searching for vegetables left undamaged after untimely...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Government has stepped up taking measures, well in advance, to avoid any situation of abnormal increase prices of onion and potato. Two major entities at national level - National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation (Nafed) and Small Farmers Agri-business Consortium (SFAC) - will be tasked to procure the two major kitchen staples and store them so that the supply can be pumped in when prices go...