New Delhi An empowered group of ministers (EGoM) on Tuesday approved additional supplies of five million tonne of subsidised wheat and rice through ration shops to people below the poverty line (BP

Renowned agriculture scientist M.S. Swaminathan has called for ensuring the sustainability of agriculture, while promoting indigenous varieties of food grains.

He lauded the provisions of the Food Security Act, which acknowledges the right to food. He said tribal people and the rural folk are a treasure house of wisdom when it came to traditional methods of cultivation. He spoke of the relevance of crops such as pokkali rice.

New Delhi The food ministry has opposed the agriculture ministry's proposal to hike the support price of paddy by over 15% to Rs 1,250 per quintal for 2012-13, saying the move would result in increase in food subsidy bill.

The minimum support price (MSP) of paddy of common and 'A' grade varieties stood at Rs 1,080 and Rs 1,110 per quintal, respectively, in the 2011-12 crop year (July-June).

The Union government has decided to protect one major river in the State on the lines of the Ganga Action Plan.

The State government has been asked to submit a proposal to conserve one major river in the State, such as Periyar, which has been badly polluted, said K.V. Thomas, Union Minister of Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution. Talking on the sidelines of a national seminar on food safety, organised by the Bureau of Indian Standards here on Monday, Prof. Thomas said the issue of drinking water pollution should be addressed at the source of the pollution of the water body.

States appear lukewarm to bail out the Centre grappling with the “problem of plenty”, as there is no response to the food ministry’s proposal for advance lifting of foodgrains.

In a bid to provide some relief to the citizens burdened by rise in prices of food items, the city government plans to soon revive a scheme under which subsidised wheat flour will be sold at over 400 outlets at around `14 per kg.

The decision to revive the scheme came after Union minister of state for food and civil supplies K.V. Thomas at a meeting with chief minister Sheila Dikshit agreed to her request to provide additional quota of subsidised wheat to Delhi.

New Delhi: Food Corporation of India (FCI) has warned that unless the government can distribute 750 lakh tonnes of food grain, there will be no storage space for the bumper harvest being currently

Food Minister K V Thomas on Monday said the problem of foodgrain storage was due to procurement exceeding targets because of record production and encouraging purchase policy, and assured the state

New Delhi With the grain stocks held with Food Corporation of India (FCI) and other state government owned agencies crossing a record level, the food ministry has proposed additional allocation of grain to BPL and APL families for dealing with storage crunch.

Under the proposal sent to finance ministry, the food ministry has proposed to hike grain allocation for the estimated 18 crore APL families to 15 kg per month from prevailing 10 kg per month. This will result in excess grains allocation of 6.5 million tonne.