India today lifted a 28-month ban on wheat export by allowing export of 900,000 tonnes of the grain by government-owned trading agencies.
Export of 650,000 tonnes of wheat products like wheat flour and maida has also been permitted, according to a notification issued by the Directorate General of Foreign Trade today.
Freedom to export and import foodgrain within a domestic price band.
To insulate poor producers and poor consumers of agricultural commodities, including consumer goods like cereals and pulses, the Economic Survey suggests the government should announce a price band for domestic prices in which imports and exports are freely allowed without any duty controls.
Micro-irrigation, watershed development need more attention.
There is clearly a need for a renewed focus on improving agricultural productivity, notes the Economic Survey, while stepping up the growth of allied and non-farm activities.
K. Balchand
NEW DELHI: The Economic Survey has painted the Agriculture sector in a rather bleak picture with a sudden drop in the growth rate during 2008-09 to just about 1.6 percent.
Funds are increasingly looking to invest in farmland as a rising global population and changing diets lead to growing demand for food crops.
But the emergence of the asset class is not without pitfalls with the provision of food always highly political and a tentative global economic recovery potentially threatened by the H1N1 flu pandemic, fund managers said.
The agriculture sector, which in previous Economic Surveys seemed to be pulling out of a bad patch, slipped back into a dismal 1.6% growth in 2008-09, the latest report said. The worst show was in the third quarter, which, on a year-on-year basis, showed a 0.8% decline.
Africa's farmers need help to access loans, fertilizer and export markets to avoid future food supply crises caused by climate change and commodities speculation, a top agricultural expert said on Tuesday.
The concept of local food is appealing to many consumers. But it is difficult to define what actually constitutes local food. Given the globalised nature of agricultural markets, bread baked in a small village bakery in England may be made from grain grown in Canada. Similarly, many of the inputs to a West Country dairy farm selling local ice cream may come from outside the UK.
