-The Indian Express Delhi air pollution: The current smog and poor air quality in the National Capital Region has been blamed in part on stubble burning by farmers, especially in neighbouring Punjab and Haryana. What is the genesis of the problem? What are its potential solutions? * How widespread is crop stubble burning? It is mainly confined to Punjab, Haryana and parts of western Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, where farmers grow paddy and...

-TheWire.in The K.R. Rao committee has only recently taken on board the views of civil society stakeholders, raising questions as to whether illegal mining and environmental issues will be properly addressed. New Delhi: A government committee in charge of revamping India’s 2008 mineral policy has belatedly agreed to rectify its industry-skewed composition by roping in several civil society stakeholders as ad-hoc members. However, according to multiple industry and environmental experts, it is unclear...

-Livemint.com A report by NEERI recommends that suitable rebate in tax or subsidies may be given to poultry farms to encourage owners to give up the present caged system New Delhi: Poultry owners should understand that animals raised for food too deserve to live free from cruelty, and so, layered battery-cage systems in India’s poultry industry should be replaced with cage-free housings in a phase-wise manner, according to a report by the...

-The Hindu Business Line At an organic market in Odisha, middle-class consumers get to interact with the producers of their food and appreciate traditional knowledge systems One Sunday morning in January, I visited an organic produce market located amidst dense bougainvillea creepers and rows of trees, on the grounds of the six-decade-old Christian Hospital in Bissamcuttack, a town in western Odisha’s Rayagada district. In policy and public imagination, Odisha, particularly its western districts...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: An environmental court in Calcutta today directed the Chhattisgarh government to halt work on 31 projects along the Mahanadi river that environmental groups fear will reduce the downstream water flow in Odisha. The Calcutta bench of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) issued a stay order on the projects, a mix of dams, barrages, irrigation channels among them, at various locations along the Mahanadi before the river enters Odisha's...