Smoke from stubble burning in Punjab may aggravate COVID-19 symptoms
Stubble burning in Punjab has annually been cited as the main contributor to the smog in Delhi and parts of northern India in pre-winter months. Delhi’s air quality levels in…
Beekeeping empowers women, brings in honey and lush kitchen gardens
Parulben Pawar has to walk through the forest of Dharampur, in Gujarat, to reach her bee boxes. A path of four kilometers crossing a forest of teak (Tectona grandis), tamarind…
Coloured cotton from India on the cusp of commercial release in 2021
After over three decades of research, an Indian variety of coloured cotton may be commercially released by 2021. A decision will be taken once the last phase of the agronomy…
[Commentary] Why the draft Seed Bill 2019 is bad for Indian farmers
Though Indian agriculture mostly fetches all the wrong headlines, there exists one legislation, which preserves farmer’s rights in the age of commercial and property rights and is a source for…
Choking the fields: Impact of mining on Goa’s paddy
Mayem is a village in Bicholim taluka of the north-eastern hinterland of Goa. It is most famous for its lake, a popular tourist spot called the Mayem lake, which underwent…
Pesticides to kill locusts harm ecosystems, signature fauna
The danger of locust swarms has passed for now. For five months from March 2020, hundreds of field teams were deployed in India and Pakistan to kill locusts that swarmed…
[Commentary] The return of the weeds
Amidst the chaos of the pandemic, a new revolution is on across world scenarios. Rebel botanists ‘chalked’ up street graffiti to highlight the flora growing in the cracks of paths…
The precarious journey of Goa’s mining-affected and dependent people
Chandrasekhar Shirodkar, 48, returned from Saudi Arabia in the early 1990s. When he came back to Maem, a village in the north-eastern mining belt of India’s western state Goa, he…
The paradox of Chhattisgarh’s summer paddy: high-yielding but water-intensive
Chhattisgarh, one of the largest rice producers in India, has ideal weather conditions and soil for growing rice. However, many farmers have been sowing the paddy crop during the dry…
Reverse migration cheers up agricultural sector in villages
Wearing a soiled kurta-pyjama, Ajay Kumar was tending to his green fields in a rural village in Uttar Pradesh. The uncertainty of the past few months is gradually making way…
