10 Crore Saplings To Be Planted To Check Desertification

Lucknow: Drought-prone Bundelkhand will now get 10 crore saplings from government's kitty. In what could be the biggest plantation target set forth ever for a region, the July 1 GO aims at improving the green cover of seven districts of the region, supposedly driven by a thought that increase in green cover would check desertification and groundwater depletion.

DH News Service, Hubli:

Former minister and senior Congress leader H K Patil will soon meet Primary Minister Manmohan Singh and Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar and appeal them to take up cloud seeding in different parts of the country to save farmers from continuous droughts. Speaking to media persons here on Monday, Mr Patil said there was an urgent need for exploring the modern technology to bail out farmers, especially living in drought-prone areas, who were suffering due to lack of rains.

Farmers accuse Centre, state of playing politics, not coming up with water management plans Banda Distt/Mahoba Distt: After two years of drought, when the monsoon finally kept its date with Bundelkhand this year, Manar Baksh made his plans: he would sow jowar and bajra on his four acres. But two weeks later, the 60-year-old farmer has been planting shrubs

But all's not well, as rain floods fields due to lack of proper irrigation system in many districts Tikamgarh District (Madhya Pradesh): When the train pulled out of Delhi station on June 12, Sukhram felt something tug at his heart. The migrant labourer was going home to his two children but had little to take back to them. The thought of his parched, sun-baked land in Kaluguan

Nagesh Prabhu BANGALORE: With monsoon becoming weak and drought looming large over Karnataka, the government has extended the weather-based crop insurance scheme to five more districts, covering 12 crops this kharif season.

New Delhi June 25: In a move which otherwise in political circles is considered a prelude to the formation of a new state, the Centre has asked the Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh governments to constitute special authorities dedicated to Bundelkhand regions of the respective states.

GORESWAR

The Southwest Monsoon has broken in right earnest much ahead of schedule over northern Madhya Pradesh that was reeling under drought conditions for the past few years. Isolated medium to heavy rain is being recorded in the rest of the state.

The Union Agriculture Ministry has worked out a package for revival of the farm sector in the drought-hit Bundelkhand region in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh on the lines of the Rehabilitation Package for Vidarbha and other drought-prone districts where farmers' suicides were high. Among other measures for relief, the Bundelkhand package suggests a debt relief for farmers in the region. It calls for contingency cropping, diversification and cross-breeding for local cattle that had lost fertility due to lack of minerals and green fodder.

The world's biggest public-works project just got bigger. In some places it is working better than many feared; but by no means everywhere

James Astill

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