-The Economic Times India will have a normal monsoon this year, says the Met office. This is good news, even though the forecast does not rule out some slack during the second half of the season. What matters finally is the distribution of rainfall across space and time rather than the aggregate percentages. However, a good monsoon is only one side of the story to have a strong farm sector. Reforms are...
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Remnants of a hungry tide-Sangeeta Barooah Pisharoty
Clinging on to their cultural moorings are monks from Assam's Majuli islands who were forced to relocate in the 1970s With land swallowed by the Brahmaputra, many monasteries of Assam's Majuli island were relocated to the mainland in the Seventies. The lives of the monks have never been the same. Indrakanta Mahanta, the head of the Vaishnava sattra (monastery), Bogi Ai, can't remember when somebody last asked him about Majuli. And there...
More »Putative farmer-friendly policy killing rural prosperity, hurting farmers-TK Arun
Rural India has been denied access to globalisation, penalising farmers and farm labour. For the farmer, the government's policy is best described as Dhritarashtra's embrace. After the Mahabharata war was over, the old king met his nephews, the victorious Pandavas, and embraced them, one by one, in a gesture of forgiving and affection. When, Bhima's turn came, the loving embrace was so tight that it crushed a metal dummy of the second...
More »Marketing arrangements for agriculture products archaic: Rangarajan
-PTI Chairman of Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council, C Rangarajan today said Agriculture Produce Marketing Committees (APMCs) have not helped the farmers in gaining higher level of income. "The marketing arrangements with respect to agricultural products remain very archaic", he said, delivering the convocation address at the University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore. "Some of the legislations such as APMC have also not helped the farmers. There is a big difference between what the...
More »Come June, bountiful Rabi harvest poses problem of plenty by Rajeev Deshpande & Surojit Gupta
A problem of plenty is looming as by June 1, an estimated 12 million tonnes of foodgrain will have to be stored in the open in "kutcha plinths" with a bountiful Rabi harvest and procurement of 65 million tonnes of grain boosting food stocks to record levels. With states like Madhya Pradesh - apart from the wheat baskets of Punjab and Haryana - delivering bonus yields, food stocks are expected to...
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