That revolution was driven by a drought and disease-resistant wheat designed by an agronomist from Iowa that yielded unprecedented harvests in Latin America and Asia. Norman Borlaug is not as famous as he should be for a man credited with saving more lives than anyone in history but he was rewarded with the Nobel Peace Prize. Uganda\'s bid to copy the Borlaug\'s revolution is built on a new breed of rice that can grow in the drier uplands instead of the traditional wetland paddy fields and has doubled the country\'s production in only four years. Uganda\'s early success is the first indication that the bid by the Coalition for African Rice Development -- a group of development agencies, led by Japan -- to double rice production on the hungriest continent could work.
\'Miracle rice\' gives Uganda hope of its own green revolution
by Daniel Howden in Kampala, The Independent, 20 March, 2009
PRIME Minister Manmohan Singh is currently visiting Vidarbha district in Maharashtra. The countrywide interest in the relief package he is expected to unveil to address farmer distress in the area highlights the importance the problem of farmer suicides has acquired in recent times. Maharashtra has seen a four-fold increase in farmer suicides in less than ten years. The number has risen from 1,083 in 1995 to 4,147 in 2004.
The end of distress
by Ila Patnaik, The Indian Express, 01 July, 2006
It is a lost opportunity. Shaken by the spate of farmer suicides in Vidarbha, the Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh did make an effort to have a first-hand feel of the agrarian crisis but failed to address the real causes behind the serial death dance. There is no denying that Dr Manmohan Singh is the first prime minister in the past 15 years to have actually visited a village (outside election campaigns).
A lost opportunity
by Devinder Sharma, Deccan Herald, 11 July, 2006
A total of 8,263 farmers committed suicide in seven States between 2003 and March, 2007. Besides Maharashtra (Vidarbha), Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh, that were given a nearly Rs. 17,000 crore rehabilitation package last year, farmers suicides were also reported from Tamil Nadu, Punjab and Gujarat. There were nearly 4,000 suicides between 2005-06 and March 31, 2007 as reported by State Governments to the Union Agriculture Ministry. In Maharashtra alone there were distress suicides by 2,329 farmers in 2006. Till February this year, 239 suicides were reported.
Over 8,000 farmers committed suicide
by Gargi Parsai, THE HINDU, 08 May, 2007
farmers have committed suicide in the past 5 years, according to a recent district-wise survey
Crisis in grain bowl
by Manish Tiwari, The Hindustan Times, 05 June, 2007
The food crisis plaguing Africa\'s economic development can be solved by applying the lessons learned from the implementation of the Green Revolution in In- dia, according to Jeffrey Sachs, eminent development economist, special adviser to the United Nations Secretary-General and Director of the Earth Institute at Colum- bia University. \"Africa is now 40 years behind India in crucial aspects of development,\" said Professor Sachs, who was speaking at the M.S. Swaminathan Re- search Foundation (MSSRF) here on Thursday. \"But thankfully, with the lessons we have learned so far, along with developments in technology and our ability to dif- fuse information today, we will not need that long a time to close that gap.\" The current food crisis in sub-Saharan Africa is similar to the agrarian crisis India faced in 1965, Professor Sachs said.
Africa can profit from Green Revolution: Sachs
by , The Hindu, 10 August, 2007
A recent ruling by the Bombay High Court that the Maharashtra government should come forward with a concrete proposal to end the era of farmers’ suicides, provides a unique opportunity to revisit the packages introduced from time to time to prevent those engaged in a life giving profession from taking their own lives. The Government of India sanctioned last year about Rs.17,000 crore to bring relief to 31 farmer suicide-prone districts of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Maharashtra. So far, over Rs.9,000 crore has been spent.
From killing fields to smiling fields
by M.S. Swaminathan, The Hindu, 17 October, 2007
Although National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data confirm an appalling 1.5 lakh farm suicides between 1997 and 2005, the figure is probably much higher. Worse, the farmers’ suicide rate (FSR) — number of suicides per 100,000 farmers — is also likely to be much higher than the disturbing 12.9 thrown up in the 2001 Census. In the five years from 1997 to 2001, there were 78,737 farm suicides recorded in the country. On average, around 15,747 each year.
Farm suicides worse after 2001- study
by P. Sainath, The Asian Age, 13 November, 2007
On average, one Indian farmer committed suicide every 32 minutes between 1997 and 2005. Since 2002, that has become one suicide every 30 minutes. However, the frequency at which farmers take their lives in any region smaller than the country — say a single State or group of States — has to be lower.
One farmer’s suicide every 30 minutes
by P. Sainath, The Hindu, 15 November, 2007
Of the 1.5 lakh Indian farmers who took their own lives between 1997 and 2005, nearly two-thirds did so in just the States of Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, and Madhya Pradesh (including Chhattisgarh). \"What\'s worse,\" says K. Nagaraj of the Madras Institute of Development Studies (MIDS), \"the trend for this group of States looks quite dismal. All four have, over the nine-year period, shown an ascending trend in farmers\' suicides\" This emerges from the painstaking study on farmers\' suicides in India between 1997 and 2005 that Professor Nagaraj has just concluded. The study draws on data from the National Crime Records Bureau. \"They began keeping farm data only from 1995,\" says Professor Nagaraj. \"But significant States did not start reporting their data till about two years later. So the study begins with the year 1997. And 2005 is the last year for which such data were available nationally.\" He has also drawn on the 2001 Census in order to calculate the suicide rate for farmers (FSR). That is, suicides per 100,000 farmers. Dramatic increase The number of Indians committing suicide each year rose from around 96,000 in 1997 to roughly 1.14 lakh in 2005. In the same period, the number of farmers taking their own lives each year shot up dramatically. From under 14,000 in 1997 to over 17,000 in 2005. While the rise in farm suicides has been on for over a decade, there have been sharp spurts in some years. For instance, 2004 saw well over 18,200 farm suicides across India. Almost two-thirds of these were in the Big Four or \'Suicide SEZ\' States.
Farm suicides rising, most intense in 4 States
by P. Sainath, The Hindu, 12 November, 2007