Articles by Mayank Bhardwaj | Manitoba Co-operator

India’s controversial farm bills become law despite protests

New Delhi | Reuters — India’s president on Sunday approved three controversial agricultural bills amid nationwide protests by farmers who say the new laws will stunt their bargaining power and instead allow large retailers to have control over pricing. Farmers’ organizations say one of the three laws could lead to the government stopping buying grain

Crops, Markets

Indian cabinet minister quits over farm legislation

By GFM Network News, Mayank Bhardwaj September 17, 2020

New Delhi | Reuters — India’s minister for food processing resigned on Thursday over her opposition to planned laws to allow farmers to sell produce directly to bulk buyers and make contract farming easier, saying the legislation will hurt millions of the country’s farmers. “Proud to stand with farmers as their daughter and sister,” Harsimrat

Markets

India to let farmers sell produce directly to traders, retailers

Current system seen reducing farmer bargaining power

By GFM Network News, Mayank Bhardwaj June 3, 2020

New Delhi | Reuters — India is to allow farmers to sell produce directly to bulk buyers such as trading companies, food processors and large retailers, the farm minister said on Wednesday. This would obviate the need for farmers to bring their produce to India’s more than 7,000 regulated wholesale markets and let buyers buy

Crops, Weather

Unseasonal rain, hail damage winter crops in India

Crop quality issues may pressure prices

By GFM Network News, Mayank Bhardwaj March 17, 2020

New Delhi | Reuters — Unseasonal torrential rains and hailstorms have damaged the winter-planted crops of millions of Indian growers, inundating wheat, potato, chickpea and rapeseed farms in large parts of the fertile northern plains, farmers said. Most farmers were caught by surprise by the repeated rain and hail that has lashed fields full of

Dairy cattle, Livestock

Indian court acquits six in cow vigilante case

By GFM Network News, Mayank Bhardwaj August 14, 2019

New Delhi | Reuters — An Indian court on Wednesday acquitted six men of the killing of a 55-year-old Muslim dairy farmer, citing lack of evidence, raising questions over the prosecution’s failure to make its case despite videos of a crowd beating him in the street. The 2017 attack on Pehlu Khan and his two

Beef cattle, Livestock

India’s top court suspends ban on trade in cattle for slaughter

By GFM Network News, Mayank Bhardwaj July 11, 2017

New Delhi | Reuters — India’s Supreme Court suspended on Tuesday a government ban on the trade of cattle for slaughter, a boost for the multi-billion dollar beef and leather industries mostly run by members of the Muslim minority. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist government in May decreed that markets could only trade cattle

Beef cattle, Livestock

India cattle trade ban to halt beef exports

By GFM Network News, Mayank Bhardwaj May 29, 2017

New Delhi | Reuters — India’s ban on the trade of cattle for slaughter threatens US$4 billion in annual beef exports and millions of jobs if the government does not revoke the stoppage decreed last week, according to two industry officials. In the latest setback to the Muslim-dominated meat industry, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government

Crops

India considering reinstating wheat import tax

By GFM Network News, Mayank Bhardwaj March 1, 2017

New Delhi | Reuters –– India could impose a 25 per cent import tax on wheat by the middle of March, two government sources said on Wednesday, reinstating the tariff after a gap of nearly three months in response to recent large purchases from overseas. India, the world’s second-biggest wheat producer, lowered the import tax

Crops, Markets

India might extend wheat import tax beyond March

By GFM Network News, Mayank Bhardwaj March 21, 2016

New Delhi | Reuters — India is likely to extend a wheat import tax beyond March to shield its domestic farmers from cheap imports, particularly as wheat from the new-season harvest will become available by the end of this month, government sources said Monday. After consulting the food, farm and trade ministries, the finance ministry

Crops

Monsanto threatens to exit India over GM royalty row

By GFM Network News, Mayank Bhardwaj March 6, 2016

New Delhi | Reuters –– Monsanto, the world’s biggest seed company, threatened to pull out of India on Friday if the government imposed a big cut in royalties that local firms pay for its genetically modified cotton seeds. Mahyco Monsanto Biotech (India), a joint venture with India’s Mahyco, licenses a gene that produces its own

CWB class-action suit a step closer to litigation

Ag publishing house Issues Ink sold

U.S. in talks with Huawei exec on resolving criminal charges, source says

GFM Network News