Due to efforts undertaken by Madhya Pradesh government, 148-kg per hectare increase has been registered in farm productivity in the state during the last four years.

The global food crisis could continue to wash up at Indian shores as well, with the World Development Report 2008, released on Friday, predicting that cereal production would have to increase by 50% by 2030 to meet the escalating worldwide demand. The increasing shift towards bio fuel, its warned, could only add to the crisis.

About 25,000 hectares are turning into double-crop lands in Sylhet district this year with cultivation of Irri-Boro in the current season for the first time. Loss of Amon paddy this year compelled farmers to cultivate Irri-Boro on the vast lands left fallow earlier. Farmers in large number in Sylhet Sadar, Golapganj, Beanibazar, Kanaighat, Zakiganj and Jaintapur upazilas are bringing the lands under paddy cultivation to recoup crop loss due to floods.

Decline of the Kerala PDS

Until a decade ago, owning a ration shop in Kerala was a status symbol. Abdul Rehman, a retail ration dealer for more than two decades, always enjoyed a special status in Ambayathode village of Kozhikode district, with over 1,700 ration card holders on his roll. Rehman was one of the 14,236 retail dealers who catered to close to 91 per cent of the state population in a model public distribution system. According to government officials, there was one ration outlet within two km radius of every household. But that was then.

albert einstein is said to have said: "If the honeybee becomes extinct, mankind will follow within four years.' The physicist wasn't entirely off the mark

the setting up of a decentralised foodgrain procurement system was once again stalled when prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee had to withdraw his suggestion in face of opposition from a number

by the year 2025, it has been predicted that around 2.7 billion people will be