The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved the Agriculture Export Policy, aimed at increasing India’s exports to $60 billion by 2022 from the current $37 billion, Commerce Minister Suresh Prabhu announced. “We have managed to increase agriculture exports to $37 billion from $30 billion in just one year,” Mr. Prabhu said at a press conference. “With […]
Make agriculture resilient, sustainable and profitable: VP
The Vice President of India, Shri M Venkaiah Naidu has called for policy interventions to bring in a positive bias towards agriculture and make it resilient, sustainable and profitable. The Vice President was Inaugurating Agri-Vision 2019 – a two-day conference on ‘Envisioning Agro Solutions for Smart and Sustainable Agriculture’ at Hyderabad. He stressed the need […]
Water storage system brings hope to farmers during dry spells
Firmenich, a Geneva-based perfumery, along with its joint venture partner Jasmine Concrete are helping farmers in South India set up the Bhungroo water harvesting system.The system involves channeling run off during the wet season to storage chamber underground and using this water during the dry spell. The aid comes in the form of funds to […]
Planting of oil-tea camellia raises villagers’ income in China’s Guizhou
A villager shows the fresh fruits of oil-tea camellia in Yuping Dong Autonomous County, southwest China’s Guizhou Province. About 13,800 hectares of oil-tea camellia have been planted and the income of villagers has risen since then. Camellia oil, also known as tea seed oil is the actual green tea oil. It comes from the seeds […]
A flower awaits its place under the sun
A kg of Gloriosa superba costs ₹3,420 (over USD$46). For farmers frustrated by the vagaries of monsoon, Tamil Nadu’s State flower, Gloriosa superba is a gold mine waiting to be exploited. The plant, which contains 24 types of alkaloids (nitrogenous organic compounds) and 10 non-alkaloidal medicinal compounds, is widely used in native medicinal compositions and […]
Moringa farmer beats the drum for growing drumstick
For 53-year-old Lakshmanan, a former banana farmer near Modakurichi in western Tamil Nadu, switching over to Moringa has opened up a world of opportunities. Read the full story at https://www.thehindu.com/business/agri-business/moringa-farmer-beats-the-drum-for-growing-drumstick/article24732055.ece SOURCE: The Hindu
China will not close the door of agricultural opening-up
China will remain committed to opening up its agricultural industries despite trade tensions with the United States, a senior Chinese official said, adding that tariffs will only have a limited impact on the country’s markets. Read the full story at http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-08/11/c_137382148.htm SOURCE: Xinhuanet
Across China: Sharing farmland: a new model for rural poverty-relief
It is the season for sowing autumn rice, yet Qiu Huihong, a farmer in south China’s Guangdong Province, is already feeling the joy of a good harvest. Thanks to the poverty-relief project, Happiness Sharing Farm, the 45-year-old farmer is likely to escape poverty. Last month, Qiu rented out 0.13 hectare of his contracted farmland to […]
Sowing traditional seeds for future harvest
For S. Sultan Ahamed Kabir of Tirumalairayar Pattinam in Karaikal of the Union Territory of Puducherry, this is the third generation’s tryst with farming. But he has transformed agriculture from a vocation to feed people into a mission to conserve seeds of traditional paddy varieties for posterity. In the last 12 years, he has grown […]
Experts draw attention to sharp fall in agriculture’s contribution to GDP
At a meeting on ‘Agriculture and Rural Management’ on Friday, Sankar Bhaumik of the Central University of South Bihar offered an overview of the problems plaguing agriculture in India – at the time of independence, this sector accounted for 55 per cent of GDP and employed 70 per cent of India’s workforce. By 2013-14, the […]