Guardians for the future

Today, vast factory trawlers are vacuuming every living thing off the floor of the oceans. Toxic wastes are being dumped on poor communities whose governments turn a blind eye. Millions of hectares of irreplaceable primeval forests are purposely being burned every year to make way for cattle ranches.

The great divide

The Planning Commission has rejected the poverty estimate made on the basis of the latest consumption expenditure survey by the National Sample Survey Office. The survey done in 2009-10 reveals a wide gap in the expenditures of the rural and urban residents. This implies high inequality. What’s more, people in villages now spend a larger share of their income on food and other necessities as compared to those in towns and cities

‘Tribal philosophy can’t be ignored beyond a point’

Your views on the tribal way of life. Interviewee:  Sanjay Basu Mullik

New poverty estimate scrapped

ARGUABLY, India does not have a poverty estimate. It faces a tough question: how to measure poverty. Confusion erupts as multiple expert groups and organisations are working on a new methodology to measure poverty.

Liquid pressure

When media reports suggested water as among the reasons for the political conflict over Telangana in Andhra Pradesh, many readers were not surprised. Analysts see water as a critical cause for almost every other political conflict. Competition for Nile water is acute between Egypt and Ethiopia. Fierce disputes also divide Turkey and its southern neighbours in the Jordan basin. India has water disputes with Bangladesh and Pakistan.

Whither peoples’ movements

The Rio summit proved graphically that even in Northern countries such as the US and Canada and the European countries, national and regional level movements on issues such as environment, sustainable development and toxic wastes did not find a voice either in the process leading up to UNCED or in UNCED itself.

Rise of livestock

Policy makers in India are finally acknowledging a structural shift in the agriculture sector they have been noticing for a decade. Economic contribution of livestock is today more than that of food grain crops. Traditionally, of the three components of the sector—crops, livestock and fisheries—crops drove the growth, and food grains are a major part of it. As a result, policy and programmes focused on crops.

High cost of fodder led milk price hike

Birmashri Rathore knows exactly how much water to add to milk so that it can still be accepted as milk.

Global food crisis: causes and implications for India

  Africa

Food processing industry takes a toll on country's health