The Wire Science – Online

As the world becomes warmer, India will lose more than 101 billion hours of labour every year, the highest of any country in the world, according to a new study. Working in hotter climes is inefficient and affects public health. An effective adaptation strategy is to move work-hours from the middle of the day to early in the day – but as the planet warms further, even this strategy will become less effective, according to the study. Although there are some efforts in India to attempt to ameliorate the loss of productivity due to climate change, climate economists believe we still have a long way to go.

Hindustan Times – Online

Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president Sukhbir Singh Badal on Sunday said that Punjabis will never give a chance to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convener Arvind Kejriwal’s failed Delhi model in Punjab. Addressing a gathering at the residence of SAD’s Patiala Rural constituency candidate Jaspal Singh Bittu Chattha after inducting scores of Congress leaders into the party, Sukhbir said, “Implementing the Delhi model will mean charging the farmers for supply of power for the agriculture sector and doing away with the free agriculture supply scheme launched by the SAD.”

Telangana Today – Online

Agriculture Minister S Niranjan Reddy wanted the bankers to extend their support and credit for oil palm cultivation, which was being promoted on a large scale in the State.Recognising the importance of sustainable agriculture, the State Government was encouraging farmers towards alternate crops as part of crop diversification, he said. Under this initiative, the State Government was moving ahead with a long term plan of promoting oil palm cultivation. To this end, bankers at the field level should cooperate and extend credit to oil palm cultivation as per NABARD instructions, he said at the State Credit Seminar 2022 here on Thursday. Addressing on the occasion, he applauded the successful partnership with NABARD in implementing Telangana’s ...

Telangana Today – Online

Omicron is unsympathetic to the small man and farmers are no exception. In the wake of the withdrawal of the three farm laws, the Finance Minister has challenges to provide resources to the farm sector. Investment of Rs 1 lakh crore was unlocked for agriculture in 2021, although the extent of, and areas of investment, are still under wraps. This is the time to introduce a separate Budget for agriculture, both in the agriculturally intensive States and the union government. MS Swaminathan in his foreword to my book on Agricultural Banking (2013) mentions: “Brain (that is, technology), brawn (that is, labour), and bank (that is, finance and other resources) are the three pillars of sustainable ...

The Times of India – Online

Country’s agricultural sector brightened up the GDP growth of the country in another year battered by the pandemic, which caused a significant decline in India’s economic activity. In the last fiscal year, while economic activity in the country suffered, agricultural sector posted a robust growth of 3.4%. The pandemic has a silver, or rather, green lining in the form of a thriving agricultural sector. Several legislations and technologies that have the potential to take India’s agricultural productivity to a higher orbit will become a part of the mix as we move towards the budget for fiscal year 2022-2023. Indian agricultural sector facing several challenges needs dedicated reforms. It is hobbled by lack of ...

Krishi Jagran – Online

Agriculture provides livelihood to around 58% of India’s population. In addition, the agricultural states in the country are producing high-quality food grains and other food goods. The Indian agriculture business is growing at a rapid rate and continues to contribute to global trade. Let me tell you that India’s grocery and food market is the world’s sixth-largest, accounting for 70% of total sales. Indian agriculture is evolving at the same time as the country develops. Food production and consumption patterns are shifting. In India, there has been a rise in population, income, rural/urban mobility, and extension of rural per capita productivity for several years. Demand for food increased as a result of the improvement of ...

Krishi Jagran – Online

Most of us would agree that India has been able to step in successfully to cater to the increased global demand after the second half of 2020, despite the unprecedented global pandemic. Our nation has emerged as a significant global supplier of food and other essential agricultural products. Indian agriculture sector was among the few segments that remained robust amid the pandemic miseries, and as per experts, the country is expected to register a growth rate of 3.6 per cent in the current financial year ending March 2022. On the other hand, India’s agricultural sector is estimated to grow by 3.9% in 2022-2023, i.e. better than the current fiscal. Various financial reports have conveyed ...

Moneycontrol – Online

Yash Tarwadi, 25, is a chemical engineer based in Surat in India’s western state of Gujarat. Four years ago, he along with three other like-minded engineers came together to develop a solar energy-based desalination plant that could be used to convert seawater into potable water, which could grow into a model for improving drinking water access in coastal states like Gujarat. Like Tarwadi’s enterprise, Solnce Technologies, many startup companies across India have ventured into the clean energy sector, developing innovations for the agricultural sector and rural households. Solnce Technologies introduced its desalination plant, Sol-Evo, in 2018. It also started a pilot project and installed its standalone unit at Olpad, a coastal village, around 30 kilometres away ...

Hindustan Times – Online

The setting up of a secondary agriculture department in Karnataka to help value addition to agricultural produce as a means to increasing–or doubling–farmer income is part of an additional “bureaucratic process” that will be of little consequence to the sector, experts say. The idea stems from the possibility of adding value to farmer-grown produce, which would help increase revenues, but overlooks the systemic challenges the sector and its practitioners face, they say. “This (secondary agriculture department) will definitely not help as they (government) could not find solutions to existing problems,” Dr Prakash Kammardi, a farm expert and former chairman of the Karnataka Agricultural Prices Commission (KAPC), said. According to the Basavaraj Bommai-led Bharatiya Janata Party ...

Telangana Today – Online

Agriculture in India has suffered a plethora of structural ailments that has contributed to the continuing crisis of the sector for long while nearly 50% of the workforce is still engaged in the farm sector. Every government that comes to power promises a better tomorrow for farmers in particular and the agriculture sector in general and probably in that direction Prime Minister Narendra Modi brought in farm laws in 2020. The government stated that the laws would transform the sector and help raise farm incomes. The merits and demerits of farm laws were debated for over a year, and none was against the need to reform the agricultural sector, which has become unremunerative and requires ...

DownToEarth – Online

India’s pledge of Panchamrit (five-fold strategy) to fight climate change, announced during the 26th Conference of the Parties (CoP26) at Glasgow, Scotland, has caught global attention. The country’s new commitments include reaching 500 gigawatt (GW) of non-fossil fuel energy capacity by 2030; producing 50 per cent of energy requirements via renewable energy sources by 2030; a reduction of 1 billion tonnes of carbon by 2030; reducing the carbon emission intensity of the GDP by 45 per cent by 2030; and most importantly, achieving the target of net-zero emissions by 2070. A basket of agreements was signed by groups of countries during the Glasgow Summit. Here, we focus our discussions on agriculture and food systems and how ...

Krishi Jagran – Online

Vertical farming is the practice of producing food and medicine in vertically stacked layers, vertically inclined surfaces, and/or integrated into other structures such as in a skyscraper, used warehouse, or shipping container. Have you ever thought of the most critical concerns that vertical farming can address, and in what ways? Keep reading the article for more information on agriculture issues and their solution through vertical Farming. Agriculture accounts for 70% of worldwide yearly water usage, making it the most significant contributor to water shortage. Agricultural farmers consume more water than any other group combined, contributing to plenty of environmental and societal issues. In comparison to traditional farming, vertical farming utilizes less than 5% of the ...

Krishi Jagran – Online

Agriculture, a vital sector of the Indian economy has a great importance. According to the Ministry of Agricultural and Farmers Welfare, agriculture and related industries provided 20.2% of the country’s Gross Value Added in FY 2020-21 at current prices. According to media, the Indian agriculture sector will be worth US$24 billion by 2025. Investing in this industry appears to be quite promising. Agriculture is one of the most important industries of the Indian economy. Agriculture employs the majority of Indians and accounts for over 17% of the country’s GDP. Getting groceries from the market may appear to be a simple task. We don’t consider the more obvious part of their availability because we’ve grown accustomed ...

The Indian Express – Online

Lately, Punjab politics has been making headlines, not always for the right reasons. The security lapse during the prime minister’s visit and the infighting within political parties signal that all is not well in the state. At the same time, all parties have made the betterment of the farming community their campaign plank in the upcoming assembly elections. The agitating farmers have launched their own party. It is no secret that Punjab, once the frontrunner of Indian agriculture, is struggling to retain its dynamism. While Punjab ranked at the top of major Indian states in terms of per capita income during 1967-68 to 2002-03, it has slipped below the 13th position and will keep ...

Hindustan Times – Online

Equipped with knowledge about the traditional practices and bio-resources in the form of People’s Biodiversity Registers, experts from the West Bengal Biodiversity Board (WBBB) are now trying to revive some of the traditional varieties of paddy, pulses, vegetables, fruits and medicinal plants. This, experts say, will not only help farmers to bring down dependency on chemical fertilisers and thereby increasing profit, but also help fight the vagaries of nature including flood, rising salinity and drought triggered by climate change and global warming. “Take paddy for example. Almost six to seven decades ago farmers in West Bengal used to grow at least 5000 varieties of desi or traditional paddy. But now we can find only around ...

Business Standard – Online

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and the Odisha government have joined hands to improve the food security of small and marginal farmers by strengthening their resilience to climate change. An agreement was signed by Agriculture Director Muthu Kumar and WFP Country Director Bishow Parajuli at a virtual programme on Thursday, the UN agency said in a release. In a pilot initiative, advisories will be provided to small farmers of the state, which is particularly prone to cyclones, to help them adapt to impact of the climate crisis. Small farmers, who constitute 90 per cent of the peasant community in Odisha, will be able to select the right agriculture and livelihood options to improve ...

Rising Kashmir – Online

Population growth rates globally have so outstripped the linear rate of increases in food production that the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) estimated that 70% more food must be produced over the next four decades in order to nourish adequately a human population projected to exceed 9 billion by the year 2050. The odds for attaining such an unprecedented increase, which would require the raising of the historically linear increases in annual food production by 37% , is substantially lessened by the consequences of climate change and variations on crop production systems. The inherent difficulties in achieving this unprecedented increase are exacerbated by the yield-depressing consequences of climate change and variations ...

BW Disrupt – Online

While most industries were struggling during the pandemic, Agritech thrived with digitisation accelerating like never before and resilience becoming a key theme of the industry. From 2017 to 2020, India received ~US$ 1 billion in agritech funding. India also ranked third in agritech funding and the number of start-ups that came up within this period. Reports suggest that by 2025, Indian agritech companies are likely to witness investments worth US$ 30-35 billion. Despite the challenges of fragmentation, limited access to finance and storage, risks related to lack of trust and enforceability, broken supply chains, business costs and challenges within policy frameworks, digitisation and tech-driven innovation helped Agritechs outperform other industries in the last two years. ...

The Indian Express – Online

Gram Acreage in Gujarat has gone past one million hectares this Rabi season, the highest recorded in the state so far, as stable prices and low cultivation costs have persuaded farmers to go for the pulse crop at the expense of cumin seeds, among other crops. As per the latest weekly sowing data released by the state government, gram (chana) sowing stands at 10.54 lakh hectare (lh) with a couple of more reporting weeks to go. This is more than double the previous three years’ average acreage of 4.66 lh and around 29 percent higher as compared to 8.19 lh recorded during Rabi season 2020-21. In terms of percentage, it is 226 per cent ...

CNBC TV18 – Online

At the core of the ongoing disagreements on the farm bills is the issue of returns on farming activity, which continue to be dismal. This is, in part, because Indian agriculture is still, unfortunately, plagued by issues of information asymmetry, lack of access to markets and institutional credit, price volatility and fragmented holdings. We believe that a ‘digital infrastructure’ approach could help pave the path forward on these hard issues. From Aadhaar based direct benefits transfer (DBT) subsidies to Unified Payments Interface (UPI) for financial transactions, from a DIGIT platform for urban services to a National Health ID in healthcare, the promise of open digital ecosystems (ODEs), anchored on shared digital infrastructure, can be seen ...

Business Standard – Online

Agriculture and allied activities are estimated to grow at 3.9 per cent in FY22, up from 3.6 per cent in the last fiscal, according to the first advance estimates of national income released on Friday. In current prices, growth is estimated to be 9.1 per cent in FY22, up from 6.6 per cent during the same period last year. This translates into an inflation impact of around 9.1 per cent. The impact, which is sometimes referred to by some economists as a proxy of farmers’ income in the absence of real-time data, was 6.6 per cent in FY21. The gross value added (GVA) in agriculture and allied activities in FY22 is slightly higher than the ...

The Tech Panda – Online

Tech has entered almost every sector in Indian industry. Still, is agtech where it should be? The Tech Panda gathered some expert agtech opinions, who say that the focus of agtech in 2022 will be on sustainable technology, digital access for farmers, and precision agriculture. When compared to sectors like EdTech, Healthtech, and FinTech, the farming sector in India has been left behind in catching up with the technology trends. However, 2021 has been a watershed year for the agritech sector in India with a significant number of new technologies having made a foray in smallholder farmer markets like India, says Anuj Kumbhat, CEO and Co-founder, Weather Risk Management Services, a smart and sustainable ...

The Economic Times – Online

Area sown to wheat, the main rabi crop, was down by 1.71 per cent at 333.97 lakh hectares so far in the ongoing 2021-22 rabi season as there was less coverage in Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Madhya Pradesh, according to the latest data released by the Agriculture Ministry on Friday. Sowing of rabi (winter) crops like wheat begins in October and harvesting from April onwards. Wheat was sown in 339.81 lakh hectares in the year-ago period. As per the data, area sown to wheat was less by 3.11 lakh hectares in Uttar Pradesh, 1.35 lakh hectares in Haryana, 1.20 lakh hectares in Maharashtra and 1.14 lakh hectares in Madhya Pradesh. Coverage of wheat was ...

The Economic Times – Online

Agriculture, the modern terminology which generalises economic activities ranging from farming to animal husbandry, had been the pillar of global economy before paving way for industrial revolution. As seen through the development of economies around the globe, development begins with people adopting agriculture, and the primary sector usually becomes the largest employer. Agriculture which started, in the early times, with an intent of subsistence, has effectively transitioned itself into a commercial marketplace, resulting in the formation of well-developed marketing systems, that has not only eliminated the thought of “double coincidence of wants”(barter), but has also underlined a need for a powerful exchange mechanism in the form of money. In India, prior to the Green ...

Rising Kashmir – Online

The importance of self reliance in agriculture production and development of agriculture and allied sectors is underrated, probably due to the excess of attention drawn by other sectors. Many experts are of the opinion that agriculture & horticulture sectors can become key drivers of UT’s economic growth in future. Unfortunately in J&K, especially in the valley agriculture lands are diminishing as designated lands are used for residential and commercial purposes. Furthermore, industrial growth and development itself had been very poorly managed in last 50 years. J&K still has agriculture and allied sectors as the spine of its economy. It is a fact that modern agriculture is driven by continuous improvements in digital tools and data ...

Telangana Today – Online

Distribution of amount under Rythu Bandhu farm investment support scheme continued for the sixth consecutive day in its eighth phase. On Tuesday, authorities deposited Rs 512.26 crore directly into the bank accounts of 1.91 lakh farmers. Till date, around 59.51 lakh farmers received Rs 5,806.35 crore during the ongoing Yasangi (Rabi) season. In a statement, Agriculture Minister S Niranjan Reddy said Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao turned agriculture sector, which was termed as good-for-nothing profession in erstwhile Andhra Pradesh, into a profit-making occupation for farmers by successfully implementing Rythu Bandhu. As a result, not only farmers returned to agriculture, but many people especially young professionals from other fields started taking up farming as a passion ...

Krishi Jagran – Online

They are young, enthusiastic, outspoken, and enthralled with the internet, smartphones, drones, agricultural farming and ‘jugaad.’ They are the latest YouTube sensation, with 182 lakh (18.2 million) subscribers for their channel Indian Farmer in three years since June 2018. The duo, both in their twenties, are from Vita, a small town in Maharashtra’s Sangli district, where getting a Wifi connection was a major issue until a few years ago. They influence farmers on innovative farming practices, irrigation, weed control, pesticide usage, the appropriate way to use fertilizers, the acquisition of high-quality seeds, crop rotation, the proper approach to sell, and other issues that are important to farmers.

Business Standard – Online

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday reached out to the farmers in Jat area of western Uttar Pradesh, which had witnessed widespread protests over the now-abolished central farm laws. Addressing a public meeting after laying the foundation of Rs 700-crore Major Dhyan Chand Sports University in Meerut, Modi said the Centre had allocated Rs 1 trillion towards ramping up agricultural infrastructure, storage houses, and cold chain network to benefit small farmers.

Krishi Jagran – Online

Farmers across the State may save over Rs 180 crore by using zero tillage technology in the upcoming summer season if they choose irrigated and dry (ID) crops in which only paddy is collected. This experiment was carried out at a hamlet in Sangareddy district’s Kangti mandal, and the yield of the farmer who tested in his field was comparable to that of other farmers. Approximately Rs 3,000 per acre will be saved.