Kerala Agri Varsity launches home garden model to promote nutritious vegetables
The Kerala Agricultural University (KAU) has launched innovative home garden model aimed at encouraging families to grow safe, nutritious vegetables in limited spaces such as terraces, balconies and small kitchen gardens. The initiative called Panchakam recommends cultivating five selected crops—drumstick, papaya, chilli, curry leaf and cowpea—in at least five pots or a small patch of […]
IMD predicts 7% rain deficit during Aug-Sept, sticks to 90% of normal rainfall projection
India Meteorological Department (IMD) on Friday forecast “below normal” rain in August and during August-September period. It predicted quantitatively less than 94 per cent of the long period average rainfall during the second half of the monsoon. The weather bureau stuck to its earlier forecast of 90 per cent (or 781.74 mm) rainfall during the […]
El Nino likely to further strengthen during October-December, Indian govt tells Upper House of Parliament
The Indian government has said that El Nino is likely to further strengthen during the October-December period, and may reach a very strong category. In a written reply in the Rajya Sabha on Thursday, Jitendra Singh, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Science and Technology and Earth Sciences, said El Nino events are generally […]
Cotton imports likely to rise to a record 60 lakh bales
Trade body Cotton Association of India (CAI) has raised the import projections of the fibre crop for the 2025-26 season ending September by 13 lakh bales to a new high of 60 lakh bales (of 170 kg each). This is in view of the consuming sector, taking advantage of the 11 per cent duty exemption, […]
El Nino strengthens, eyes strongest levels since 1950, says Australian Met body
El Nino, which has been in place since mid-June, continues to strengthen, with further intensification likely in the coming months, according to the Southern Hemisphere monitoring report from the Bureau of Meteorology, Australia (BoM) The warming in the central tropical Pacific is indicative of a strong to very strong El Nino event. Most models indicate […]
Heavy rain over Maharashtra, Odisha, Goa, AP, Ktka, West Bengal
The monsoon may go to upend forecasts of a July fade-out, staging an emphatic comeback on the back of a relentless succession of Bay of Bengal low-pressure systems, almost recreating the season’s peak wet spell earlier this month. The clearest sign of the revival came on Monday when a low-pressure area over the north-west Bay of Bengal […]
Technology as an enabler: Reimagining Indian agritech
India has produced hundreds of agritech startups over the past decade, attracted more than two billion dollars in venture capital, and still cannot point to a definitive pure-play agritech unicorn in the field. That gap between investor enthusiasm and commercial outcomes is not a failure of technology. Rather, it reflects a deeper reality: technology investments […]
Climate risk, El Niño and rural credit: Rethinking financial resilience for farmers
Climate change is no longer only an agricultural challenge. It is increasingly a financial challenge, shaping how rural households earn, borrow, save and recover from economic shocks. The southwest monsoon has progressed across India, yet rainfall remains uneven in several regions, affecting the kharif sowing season. El Niño is among the weather factors that can […]
Farm R&D drove a third of India’s increase in agri output in 2025: Icar
Agriculture research and development (R&D) contributed a third of the total value of output increase – estimated at around Rs 1.7 trillion – between 2024 and 2025, a recent report by the Indian Council for Agricultural Research (Icar) has found. In absolute terms, that works out to about Rs 50,000 crore, the Icar data showed. […]
South Gujarat deluge shatters records as another ‘low’ looms over Bay
One of the most eventful rainstorms in recent memory pummelled South Gujarat as a rare convergence of Arabian Sea moisture and favourable dynamics unleashed cloudbursts of staggering intensity, with Umergam in Valsad district recording an astonishing 106 cm of rain in just 24 hours ending Thursday morning. The deluge rewrote rainfall charts across the region. […]