Media Monitor
Agriculture Industry
International Trade Puts Indian Farmers and Food Security at Riskedit
News Click – Online
Movements and struggles to protect small and medium farmers from the onslaught of big business are going on in many countries. These struggles have uncovered a hidden enemy of farmers everywhere—it is the rules that underpin international trade agreements. Their clauses favour big business interests at the cost of farmers.
The problems exist on two planes—in the World Trade Organization (WTO) rules and the Free Trade Agreements (FTAs).
The WTO has interlinked agricultural issues with international trade. This was not the case under earlier trade arrangements. What is more, this has been done mainly based on the self-interest of the United States and the European Union. However, the average farm size in these countries, for farming, ...
Opinion: Karnataka Farm Laws And Worsening Agrarian Crisis In Stateedit
The Logical Indian – Online
Vidhan Soudha Chalo! This is the war-cry of Kannadigas across the state right now. A joint coalition of farmer-worker-Dalit groups, student organizations and women organizations with people from across Karnataka are set to storm Bengaluru on March 22, Monday. National farm leaders including Rakesh Tikait, Dr Darshan Pal Singh and Yaduveer Singh of the Samyukt Kisan Morcha have already arrived in Karnataka, to protest.
Technology in Agriculture
Agri-tech startup to raise Rs 5cr for expansionedit
The Times of India – Online
Ahmedabad-based Agri-tech startup, Rise Hydroponics, is looking to raise a sum of Rs 5 crore by the first quarter of 2021-22. Presently incubated at Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India (EDII), the startup enables people to set-up soil-less farms that are commercially scalable. So far, it has set up some 15 commercial soil-less farms for cultivating vegetables across some seven Indian states, namely Gujarat, Maharashtra, Delhi, UP, Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand and Haryana, since its inception in April 2020. “Several investors have approached us for funding and we expect to raise a sum of Rs 5 crore by the first quarter,” said Meet Patel, founder, Rise Hydroponics.
“At present, we have a total of 2 lakh sq ...Advances in agritech revealed to tackle global sustainabilityedit
Digital Journal – Online
From using plasma to convert water into the starting material for fertilizers to growing plants in self-watering gels, agritech is rife with innovations. As pressure grows on addressing global food problems, we consider three developments in the field.
Finding ways to boost agricultural production around the planet is a matter of pressing importance. The current pattern of productivity gaps, should they persist, will have serious ramifications for environmental sustainability, the economic vitality of the agriculture sector, and the prospects for reducing poverty, malnutrition, and obesity.
One area that can assist in meeting such challenges is technological and scientific advances in the agriculture field (agritech). We look at three examples of recent innovation in this domain.The agri-tech conundrum – sustainable solutions or status quo?edit
The New Food Magazine – Online
We have evolved from the classic hunting and gathering practices that defined survival for our ancestors 12,000 years ago, to food cultivation techniques that include engineering seeds, employing robots to slaughter livestock, and using satellites to monitor land changes. These developments pack a lot of promise, especially if they manage to coalesce with more traditional practices, like organic agriculture and supporting local producers. However, if not deliberately designed with respect to building a more sustainable future, they can perpetuate the fundamentally degenerative system from which they emerge.
A glimmer of hope for an improved food system?
Agri-tech, as it’s colloquially called, encompasses a range of products, usually employing various configurations of and alliances between ...
Stubble Burning
Punjab, Haryana officials study effect of bio-decomposeredit
The New Indian Express – Online
Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai on Friday held a meeting with environment department officials from Punjab and Haryana regarding the issue of crop residue burning. According to the Delhi government, a delegation of senior officials from the two neighbouring states arrived in the national capital on Friday to study the effect of the bio-decomposer.
Rai said that the delegations of both states took detailed information about the effects of spraying of the bio-decomposer made by the Kejriwal government to solve the problem of stubble burning. “All the states will have to make concerted efforts to solve the problem of stubble burning. A centralised arrangement will have to be made for this and a centre ...
Delhi Minister calls for collective efforts to tackle stubble burningedit
Daijiworld – Online
Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai on Friday sought support and assistance from the officials of Haryana and Punjab to tackle the issue of stubble burning.
Rai chaired a meeting with a delegation of officials from Haryana and Punjab at Delhi Secretariat, where he asserted the need for a centralised arrangement to resolve the stubble burning issue.
The Minister also emphasised that each district should have a monitoring system for bio-compositing and bio-decomposer should be distributed free of cost to the farmers.