Media Monitor
Agriculture Industry
A Growing Presence on the Farm: Robotsedit
In a research field off Highway 54 last autumn, corn stalks shimmered in rows 40 feet deep. Girish Chowdhary, an agricultural engineer at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, bent to place a small white robot at the edge of a row marked 103. The robot, named TerraSentia, resembled a souped up version of a lawn mower, with all-terrain wheels and a high-resolution camera on each side.
In much the same way that self-driving cars “see” their surroundings, TerraSentia navigates a field by sending out thousands of laser pulses to scan its environment. A few clicks on a tablet were all that were needed to orient the robot at the start of the row before it took ...
Govt closely monitoring agriculture credit given by banks: FM `edit
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday said the government is monitoring farm credit given by banks in rural areas, adding that she expects to meet the increased target of Rs 15 lakh crore for the next fiscal.
The government in Budget 2020-21 has raised the farm loan disbursal target by 11 per cent to Rs 15 lakh crore for the next fiscal and allocated Rs 1.6 lakh crore to implement various plans in agriculture and allied sectors as it chases the goal of doubling farmers income by 2022.
Draft bill proposes fund to compensate farmers for bad pesticides, hike in penaltiesedit
A corpus fund to the tune of Rs 50,000 crore to compensate farmers for pesticide-related crop failure and higher penalties for using banned pesticides are some of the key provisions of the draft Pesticide Management bill cleared by the Union cabinet Wednesday, ThePrint has learnt.
The Pesticides Management Bill, 2020, meant to replace the existing Insecticides Act of 1968, is being piloted by the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers, and will be introduced in the Budget session when it reconvenes in March.
Water consumption cut to half, 175 Doaba farmers reap benefitedit
A year ago, Joginder Singh of the district’s Samra village used to spend 70 to80 days watering his fields. Furrows in his fields were large and the amount of water consumption was high. In a period of 12 months, he has reduced the water input drastically while making money out it. Thanks to the state government’s Pani Bachao Paisa Kamao scheme, farmers have started realising that fields can be irrigated with less water.
PM Kisan Samman Nidhi: Only 11 farmers benefitted in this state!edit
Only 11 farmers in the state of Sikkim benefitted under PM-KISAN scheme till February 6, 2020. There are, however, over 11,000 farmers of the state “successfully registered” under this scheme, the Central government told the Parliament in a written reply this week. As per the government’s data, the state with the most number of beneficiaries is Uttar Pradesh. As many as 675 18,735,405 farmers of UP have benefitted till February 6, while the total number of farmers of the state registered under the scheme is 23,003,675.
Doubling farmer’s income: Ease doing of agri-businessedit
The past few successive Union budgets have referred to PM Modi’s dream of doubling farmer incomes (DFI) as the principle guiding the government’s agricultural policies. It is both encouraging and heartening to know that this government is still steadfast on the dream, and is finding ways to achieve it. We take stock of the situation.
The PM first announced the goal of DFI at a farmer’s rally in Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh in February 2016. He shared that he wanted to achieve this goal by FY23. The year was chosen as it marks the 75th year of India’s independence, and this would be an ideal gift for the farming community on the occasion. Between FY16 and FY23, the ...
Govt closely monitoring agriculture credit given by banks: FMedit
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday said the government is monitoring farm credit given by banks in rural areas, adding that she expects to meet the increased target of Rs 15 lakh crore for the next fiscal. The government in Budget 2020-21 has raised the farm loan disbursal target by 11 per cent to Rs 15 lakh crore for the next fiscal and allocated Rs 1.6 lakh crore to implement various plans in agriculture and allied sectors as it chases the goal of doubling farmers income by 2022.
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Can Indian farmers adapt to water lossedit
Over the last few decades, groundwater has become the major source of irrigation for Indian agriculture. Pumped by millions of privately-owned tube-wells, it contributes 60 percent of the water used for irrigation, having grown by 105 percent since the 1970s. However, India is now facing a severe crisis of groundwater depletion, and the most vulnerable are the hundreds of millions of small-scale farmers who crucially depend on irrigation water for their livelihoods.