-Down to Earth The central government has mandated digitally capturing the attendance of all workers under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGnregs). Labourers and activist groups have opposed this and pointed out several loopholes in the move. The National Mobile Monitoring System, which came into effect on January 1, 2023, was launched with claims of bringing transparency and eliminating corruption at the ground level. Pilot tests began in May 2021 at...

-Business Standard The paddy procurement process started in the state-run primary cooperative societies' 2,600 procurement centres from November 1 Raipur: Chhattisgarh is moving ahead to meet its paddy procurement target even as 70 per cent of it has been purchased from farmers. One of the few States in the country to procure paddy from farmers at minimum support price (MSP), Chhattisgarh has set a target to purchase 11 million tonnes (MT) during the...

The World Food and Agriculture – Statistical Yearbook 2022, released in December 2022, provides its readers a plethora of useful statistics and data across the countries pertaining to agriculture and food security. The yearbook by Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) primarily covers four themes -- Economic Dimensions of Agriculture; Production, Trade and Prices of Commodities; Food Security and Nutrition; and Sustainability and Environmental Aspects of Agriculture.  While going through the report,...

-The Hindu In an effort to restore the unique ecosystem of the Sundarbans, the SAIME initiative has shrimp cultivators tending to mangroves around their farms as well A new initiative of sustainable shrimp cultivation provides hope for mangrove restoration in Sundarbans. For several years, environmentalists and experts have expressed concerns over unsustainable aquaculture, particularly shrimp collection, after cleaning large tracts of mangrove forests in Sunderbans. Under the initiative, Sustainable Aquaculture In Mangrove Ecosystem...

-The Hindu They make up 57.8% of the scheme beneficiaries in 2022-23 — a 10-year high; Bihar and U.P. record a high proportion of women workers The proportion of women workers participating in the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) has touched a ten-year high in the ongoing financial year. According to the latest statistics available with the Union Ministry of Rural Development, 57.8% of the workers who used the...