Full Coverage: Agriculture

31.10.2005 Starting today, the fast food giant will sell Fair Trade Certified coffee in 658 stores throughout the northeast United States, supporting a living wage for global coffee producers.

31.10.2005 Multinational and Indian seed companies are paying Indian farmers who are producing their cotton seed almost 40%- too little to enable them to hire adults for the local minimum wage of Rs.52 (€1,-) instead of children. The companies are multinationals like Bayer, Monsanto and Syngenta but also Indian companies like Nuziveedu Seeds, Raasi Seeds and Ankur Seeds.

26.10.2005 African governments and donors have launched an ambitious plan to fight desertification, which causes chronic food shortages and threatens to drive millions from their homes in coming decades.

20.10.2005 Talks within the World Trade Organisation (WTO) on farming subsidies have run aground. According to the United States and the European Union, the matter puts the success of the whole world trade meeting at risk.

19.10.2005 According to Minister for Science, & Technology, Ocean Development Mr. Kapil Sibal, we need information technology to empower our farmers to sell their produce when market conditions are favourable. We must empower our farmers with agricultural produce with enhanced shelf life. To benefit from such technologies, we need to develop cold chains from the field to the supermarket.

19.10.2005 Sam Pitroda, The telecom pioneer confers that the true knowledge can empower people at all levels. It can make our people aware of their rights and responsibilities. It can also provide them tools and techniques to be productive and meaningful in the information age. To achieve this, the best brains in the country will have to focus urgently on solving problems of the poor and the underprivileged at the bottom of the pyramid.

18.10.2005 A coalition of 17 Asia-based NGOs has urged authorities to impose a global ban on genetically modified rice.

17.10.2005 Milka Babic, the Representative of the Population Office, said that the families of senior citizens in Vojvodina are prepared to accept refugee families living in collective centres in their households, under certain conditions that are to be defined later.

05.10.2005 Some 200 years after uprising against French colonial rule, inequitable land distribution and agricultural and trade policies that marginalize the peasant sector continue to inhibit Haiti's development, says Djems Olivier.

04.10.2005 Mr Sharad Pawar , The Union Agriculture Minister Agriculture envisions empowerment of the country for rural people, when the benefits of the business of private and public sectors include rural and marginal farmers of the country .