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Cash Crops
Fire in the mountain
Issue Date: Sep 30, 2012
Rising mercury has taken its toll not just in the plains but also in the Himalayan mountains. A longer-than-usual summer and absence of moisture led to proliferation of forest fires. A common sight across Himachal Pradesh this summer was forests, especially chir pine forests in the lower and middle Himalayas, covered with uncontrollable flames by night and smoke by day.
Letters - March 31, 2012
Issue Date: Mar 31, 2012
Science restricted
Paan loses flavour
@Richard20711534 Issue Date: Mar 31, 2011
The way paan is associated with India, a Chaurasia is associated with paan. But both the equations are changing, said Lalta Prasad Chaurasia, spitting blood red betel juice into an elegantly designed brass spittoon. The 58-year-old is among the last generation of Chaurasia farmers in Mahoba district of Uttar Pradesh who have witnessed betel leaves yield a fortune. Both betel leaves and the Chaurasias are an integral part of Mahoba’s history. The district is known for its betel gardens and the Chaurasias are India’s exclusive community devoted to betel farming. But they are now finding it difficult to sustain the family occupation.
Too costly to grow
Issue Date: Mar 31, 2011
Betel leaves were once dubbed green gold. But farmers do not find betel farming lucrative anymore. Besides low demand, it is the rising input cost, primarily for irrigation, that is discouraging betel farmers.
High altitude dams cause low apple yield
Issue Date: Jul 15, 2010
Satya Devi’s 35 apple trees have borne few fruits this year. The 60- year-old blames it on too little moisture in the soil and too much dust in the air that settles on the leaves.
Letters
Issue Date: May 31, 2010
Desert cash crops will make India poor
The western part of India, specifically the dry region, will play an important role in determining the Indian monsoon and even global climate patterns. Our team at the Central Arid Zone Research Institute (CAZRI) recently completed an analysis on groundwater depletion in Jaisalmer district of Rajasthan and found an overall decline of 20 cm per year; there was no significant recharge through monsoon rainfall.
South Asia
Issue Date: Mar 15, 2009
some relief: Sri Lanka will supply special energy food packages to civilians fleeing the war regions in northern Sri Lanka. More than 30,000 civilians are living in welfare centres and some in camps, said Sri Lanka's Minister for Resettlement and Disaster Relief Services Rishard Badurdeen. Food, shelter, medical help, clean water and latrines are immediate requirements, said Toril Brekke, Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) Country Director in Sri Lanka . NRC is distributing emergency shelters to the transit camps.
Who will grow food?
Issue Date: Sep 30, 2008
Kerala's new Bill protects paddy fields, but farmers find fewer reasons to cultivate rice
Faced with severe rice shortage and acute water scarcity, Kerala Assembly on July 24 passed a legislation prohibiting indiscriminate
reclamation of paddy fields. The Kerala Conservation of Paddy Land and Wetland Bill, 2007, received the governor's assent in early August and
is now being printed for notification.
Profit from an acre
Issue Date: Sep 15, 2005
In the tiny village of Dasayanadoddy in Tamil Nadu's Krishnagiri district, thirty-five families farming meagre plots of groundnut and ragi barely keep their hearth fires burning. However, a lone farmer's experimentation on his one acre (.4 ha) land has entirely reversed his fortunes.
Spice route
Issue Date: Jul 15, 2005
Uttaranchal, a recently formed hill state in the Indian Himalaya region, constitutes a diverse social, cultural, agro-economic and environmental entity. For about 78 per cent of the people here, farming is the primary livelihood, with tourism as a popular second occupation.
