-Live Mint By giving in to pressure from the US and EU, India has landed itself and the developing world in a bad trade deal The stenographic cacophony in the Indian media had a singular triumphalist message from the ninth World Trade Organization (WTO) ministerial meet in Bali: India had secured a major victory by safeguarding its food security programme and stood its ground against the US and the European Union...

-The Indian Express India faces no risk of violating its commitments under WTO The Indian delegation, led by commerce minister Anand Sharma, is approaching the WTO Ministerial in Bali with a ‘begging bowl'. The government has agreed to the so-called ‘peace clause'-a euphemism for not taking any penal action for violating commitments under Agreement on Agriculture (AoA)-proposed by WTO Director General but with the caveat that this will remain in place until...

-The Hindu Appachi eco-logic cotton project is a unique organic cotton contract farm model in the Western Ghats region of Kabini Reservoir. The project covers nearly 1,200 farmers spread over 1,875 acres. Over 17 per cent of the area comes under reserve forests of both Karnataka and Tamil Nadu and exposing the cultivation fields to wild animal attacks is forcing farmers to start cotton cultivation on a mono cropping basis instead of...

-The Hindu Reckless use of pesticides led to high incidence of diseases, say farmers KADALANGUDI (NAGAPATTINAM, Tamil Nadu): Yellow blades of paddy grass bereft of tillers glisten against the scorching noon sun. For the farmers of Vada Kadalangudi in Orkudi panchayat, the 80-100 day pesticide-infested paddy crop will not make up even for good fodder. Vast stretches of directly-sowed fields of Keezhvelur block here, lie wilted under mealy bug attack. The story stretches across...

-The Indian Express On the surface, the sugar crisis in Uttar Pradesh may seem to be inching closer to a resolution. But cane farmers may have unwittingly mortgaged their land, signing up for crop loans from public sector banks, with the money so raised being used by the mills to pay arrears of a different set of farmers. This model, of mills rotating working capital loans from banks, to deliver pending payouts...