The Niti Aayog recently released its National Multidimensional Poverty Index 2023, according to which the poverty headcount ratio declined from 24.85 percent in 2015-16 to 14.96 percent in 2019-21. In absolute numbers this translates to 135 million people exiting multidimensional poverty in this time period. In addition, a few days earlier, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) released its own Multidimensional Poverty Index, which in a press note said that,...

KEY TRENDS   • Oxfam India's 2023 India Supplement report on poverty and inequality in India reveals that the gap between the rich and the poor is widening. Following the pandemic in 2019, the bottom 50 per cent of the population have continued to see their wealth chipped away. By 2020, their income share was estimated to have fallen to only 13 per cent of the national income and have less than 3...

The Centre will introduce new guidelines for releasing subsidies to farmers for the purchase of farm machinery and tools, Union Minister of State for Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Shobha Karandlaje has said. A major portion of the subsidy is at present set apart for the purchase of tractors and farmers are not able to purchase other farm machineries and tools required for their daily work, she said.  The minister asked youth...

-Livemint.com Tackle deficiencies of capital mobilization, access to state provisions and women’s participation to boost FPCs across India. In 2017, the Indian government reaffirmed its commitment to reduce rural distress among nearly 93 million farming households through efforts to double farmers’ income. What has been remarkable is the emergence of farmer producer companies (FPCs) as a viable way of supporting this approach. The last two years have been tumultuous. Pro-market legislation introduced in...

-Foundation for Agrarian Studies In December 2020, in line with the Central Farm Laws, the Government of Karnataka passed an amendment to the Karnataka Agricultural Produce Marketing (Regulation and Development) Act, 1966. This amendment reduced the scope of the Agricultural Produce Marketing Committees (APMC) by effectively ending their status as the only place (with some exceptions) where wholesale agricultural trade was permitted by law. Despite the three Central Farm Laws being...