Never mind wishful thinking by the government and RBI. Food will never be cheaper than what it is today. Not this year. Or in future. The reason is simple. Growing food in India has become extremely expensive. Crops are pricier even before they reach the market and face the pulls and tugs of rising local demand and exports. The farmer’s single biggest cost now is labour. Farm labour wages have doubled...

While renewable energy was always considered more desirable from the point of view of environment protection, its importance has increased several times in these times of climate change. Solar energy is particularly seen as a very promising source in energy planning for the future in tropical countries like India. Interest in realising the potential of solar energy is fast increasing and organisations which have been pioneers in solar energy are...

Two months after Uttar Pradesh government launched a campaign to give incentives for the scheme of giving 100-day employment to 10 lakh marginalised families under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), it has become a bone of contention between the Centre and the state government. Under the initiative, the state had decided to appoint a nodal agency, identify civil society organisations and give them incentives for ensuring 80 to...

India needs to introduce competition in the public distribution system (PDS) for its ambitious food-for- all programme to work, according to country's chief economic advisor Kaushik Basu. In an exclusive interview with NDTV, Basu outlines that if the government tries to provide food security through the present system, it will need to procure 140 million tonne of foodgrain. “The agriculture ministry has given some estimates that 62 million is what you...

The Food Security Act was UPA-2’s flagship programme. Jean Dreze, member of the National Advisory Council, has publicly criticised the government. He tells VAIBHAV VATS what’s gone wrong. Much like the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in the first term of the United Progressive Alliance, the Food Security Act was its most ambitious social welfare programme. Since discussions on the Act in the National Advisory Council began, its provisions...