Media Monitor
Agriculture Industry
Clean push: Why compressed biogas has an edge over CNGedit
Down To Earth – Online
How about filling up your vehicle with straw and running it for a full year? If this sounds bizarre, then here’s more. Verbio AG, a German company, claims that you can actually do it with just two tonnes of straw.
The company is now busy setting up a plant in the middle of lush paddy fields at Bhutal Kalan village in Punjab’s Sangrur district. “Our plant will procure paddy stubble from within 15 km radius of the plant and use it as raw material,” said Yuvraj Verma, a project manager.
The plant should start producing compressed biogas (CBG) in June or July. CBG holds a win-win solution to the country’s air pollution problems.
The plant will use ...
Agri Hack to evolve sustainable farming solutionsedit
Hindu – Online
It will be part of annual agri expo VAIGA 2021
A hackathon centred around sustainable agricultural development will be part of the annual agri expo VAIGA (Value Addition for Income Generation in
‘How My Love For Farming Is Keeping Me Fit at 93’edit
The Better India – Online
Even at the age of 93, Chidambaram Nair is firmly planted on his feet. The nonagenarian has been practicing agriculture since his childhood, and credits his health and fitness to it.
“Agriculture is the foundation of everything in this world,” he tells The Better India, adding, “The day we forget this fact, our failures begin.” Nair, a native of Kerala’s Kozhikode, says the scent of the soil is his motivation.
Nair’s love for the profession stems from the small vegetable garden he had at home as a child. His gardening hobby eventually transformed into full-fledged cultivation of a barren land that his parents owned. Then there was no looking back.
“I worked as a primary ...
Billionaires-Led ‘Gilded Age’ Comes Under Attack in Modi’s Indiaedit
Bloomberg – Online
Two of India’s richest men have landed in an unlikely controversy over farming laws, becoming targets of protesters who allege the tycoons have benefited from their close links to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
For weeks, tens of thousands of farmers have camped outside the nation’s capital, demanding the withdrawal of recently passed legislation they say, without evidence, was designed to allow billionaires such as Mukesh Ambani and Gautam Adani to enter farming. The tycoons say they have no such interest. More than 1,500 phone towers of Ambani’s wireless carrier were vandalized last month and some farmers called for a boycott of their businesses.
The minimum support price conundrum and Indian farmingedit
Down To Earth – Online
The propaganda minister of Adolf Hitler, Joseph Goebbels, believed that when a lie is told a hundred times, it becomes the truth. Similarly, a factoid is an item of unreliable information which is reported and repeated so often that it becomes accepted as fact.
This, in a nutshell, explains the conundrum of the minimum support price (MSP) on which there is an ongoing farmers strike around New Delhi. The MSP sets a floor below which prices for agricultural commodities do not fall.
There are 23 agricultural commodities listed by the central government under the MSP. Most Indians, with an agricultural background or not, think that the MSP concerns only wheat and rice, the two pillars ...
Technology in Agriculture
AgriTech Startup WayCool Foods Join Hands with IIT-Hyderabad to Develop Packaging Solution to Reduce Food Wastageedit
IndiaWeb2 – Online
WayCool Foods has signed a 3-year MoU with IIT Hyderabad (IIT-H) to develop antimicrobial food packaging material by using biopolymers. The MoU was signed and exchanged between Karthik Jayaraman, CEO, WayCool Foods and Sumohana Channappayya, Dean (R&D), IIT-H in Hyderabad.
The aim is to develop economically viable and biodegradable packaging that will retain the freshness of fruits and vegetables longer, leading to a reduction in food wastage across the supply chain by upto 20%. This packing material will enhance the shelf life of mainstream fruits and vegetables such as okra, capsicum, Indian gooseberry, and guava as well as exotic produce such as strawberry and broccoli. WayCool will invest close to INR 2 million over a period of ...
Prosus says it is funding Indian agriculture tech firmedit
IOL – Online
DeHAAT, a technology-based platform offering end-to-end agricultural services to farmers in India yesterday said it had raised $30 million (about R450 million) in Series C funding, led by Prosus Ventures, formerly called Naspers Ventures.
RTP Global co-invested in the round with participation from existing investors, Sequoia India, FMO, Omnivore and AgFunder.
DeHaat co-founder and chief executive Shashank Kumar said the DeHaat value proposition was very well demonstrated at a sizeable scale. The firm was improving the livelihoods of Indian farmers and rural micro-entrepreneurs with the help of technology.
“The recent investment from marquee investors like Prosus Ventures, RTP Global and others is a strong validation of our goal to become the world’s largest farmer aggregator and will ...
Govt. Policies
Farmers to get documents on phone through m-governance, new startup policy to be launched: CM Shivraj Chauhanedit
Smart City – Online
Good news for Madhya Pradesh farmers, as they will be getting basic revenue records and documents like maps, B1 copies, khasra, on their mobile phones from January 25. This has been made possible with the launch of India’s unique mobile governance initiative by the Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Shivraj Singh Chouhan. The CM will open the innovative initiative to the people on January 25.
Farmers will be able to access the information with a simple phone call on the CM Helpline-181 by sharing basic info like their Aadhaar and mobile numbers. Following the call, a copy of the desired documents like B1, Khasra, and Maps will be sent on the registered mobile number.
Moreover, under the ...