Another name for Chhattisgarh is ' Dhan ka katora' or 'Rice Bowl'. There is an amazing variety of rice being grown across the region in Central India, largely dominated by tribal communities. This is a land blessed by the bounty of nature and has a combination of soil, water and temperature, which lends itself well to the cultivation of this all-important foodgrain. Yet all this amounts to very little today and...

The 50-year-old farmer knew from experience that his onion crop was doomed when torrential rains pounded his fields throughout September, a month when the Indian monsoon normally peters out. For lack of modern agricultural systems in this part of rural India, his land does not have adequate drainage trenches, and he has no safe, dry place to store onions. The farmer, Arun Namder Talele, said he lost 70 percent of...

These days, Jhum cultivation also known as ‘slash and burn method of cultivation’, ‘shifting cultivation’ etc has been under continuous scanner for its productivity and ecological viability. This form of cultivation is followed widely in almost all the North Eastern States including the hill areas of Manipur. There are those who consider jhum cultivation as unproductive and ecologically disastrous so that people (understood as tribal people of the hill areas)...

Next time you help yourself to some sea food, you could be helping save the planet. Agricultural experts believe that in the wake of rising sea level and shrinking cultivable land in the country due to climate change, sea could be the key to ensuring food security. "The rising sea has eaten away lands, especially farmlands. In fact, large tracts of farmlands in the coastal belt of the state, especially...

With one cotton farmer committing suicide every alternate day, the district has become a virtual killing field for growers grappling with the socio-economic upheaval caused by crop failure this season. The current spate of suicides started at the beginning of the last quarter of 2010, when it became clear that the excessive rain irreparably damaged the crops. Dismal yields and mounting debts drove 30 farmers to death during this period. With 16...