Good Food is First Food. It is not junk food. It is the food that connects nature and nutrition with livelihoods. This food is good for our health; it comes from the rich biodiversity of our regions; it provides employment to people. Most importantly, cooking and eating give us pleasure. …
continuous submerged paddy cultivation doesn't harm soil as believed. Rather, it improves fertility as compared to other agricultural systems, claims a study by researchers from Hyderabad-based International Crop Research Institute for Semi Arid Tropics (icrisat) and the National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land Use Pattern, Nagpur. The study found …
India faces an acute problem of soil erosion. On an average, the country is losing soil at a rate of 16 tonnes per hectare (ha) annually, which is more than three times the acceptable limit of 4-5 tonnes. Even the Union agriculture minister, Sharad Pawar, had raised concern over the …
abundant bacteria: Scientists say soil contains 100 times more bacteria species than believed. Previous studies estimated a gramme of unpolluted soil contained about 10,000 bacteria species. But a fresh analysis of soil data by researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, the US, suggests the actual number …
The Seeds Bill 2004, which aims to replace the Seeds Act, 1966, is with the Indian Parliament. It is a bone of contention. Between interests of farmers and the private seeds industry. Parliament’s standing committee on agriculture is looking into this bill, drawing widespread criticism for favouring the seed industry …
soil produces almost 70 per cent more of the polluting oxides of nitrogen (nox) than previously believed, claims a new study based on satellite data. Led by Lyatt Jaegl
ecologists have long wondered why forests decline in the absence of catastrophic disturbances. A study, published in Science, sheds light on this issue. During the study, an international team of researchers investigated natural forested stands across six
an international study has identified north India as one of four hotspots worldwide where rainfall seems to be directly linked to the amount of moisture in the soil. The finding of the ongoing Global Land-Atmosphere Coupling Experiment (glace) comes at the time when India is contemplating to improve its region-wise …
turkish scientists have discovered a plant that can remove boron from soils. They say that it could provide a low cost method to clean up soil contaminated with the naturally-occurring trace element, which is toxic to most crops at high concentrations. Scientists from Selcuk University found that Gypsophila sphaerocephala
70 years ago, a species called the yellow crazy ant (Anoplolepis gracilipes) turned up at the Christmas Islands off Australia, perhaps stuck to a piece of timber. For a long time, it remained dormant. Then in the mid 1990s, its population began to explode. Yellow crazy ants began to form …
What are the various methods of managing invasive weeds? The government generally comes to know about invasive weeds 10-15 years after they are introduced. By then, they are already spread over wide areas and their extinction becomes impossible. The only thing that can make a difference is the people's awareness. …
How easy is it to predict the potential of a plant to become invasive in a new habitat? When an alien species, be it a pest or a weed gets into another habitat, there is generally a time lag before it becomes invasive. Its introduction, as such is sudden and …
What are the modes of successful invasiveness? There have been some studies on recruitment of pollinators by lantana. When lantana invades as an invasive species into a native ecosystemit proliferates and increases its density and biomass. Consequently, there is a chance that it usurps the native pollinators from the native …
function alien2() { var popurl="image/20040229/30-illus.jpg" winpops=window.open(popurl,"","width=475,height=450,scrollbars=yes") } "A successful invasion is a rare event,' says Suresh Babu, a researcher at the School of Environmental Studies, University of Delhi. An accepted thumbrule is that only one in 10 introduced species become naturalised, and only one in 10 among the latter actually …
Last year, a cricketing row broke out between New Zealand and India, when a member of the Indian team was fined for carrying soiled shoes. For India, it was cricketing pride at stake. But New Zealand customs authorities were merely following quarantine regulations. The shoes could have carried a possible …
Massive erosion along the southern bank of the Brahmaputra in its 150-kilometre course from Hatimura to Kapilimukh in Nagaon district in Assam has placed people's lives
Desolate, cold, inhospitable, relegated to the backyards of exploration and knowledge. Antarctica did not emerge from this unfortunate fate till less than 100 years ago, before which, whalers and seafarers were its only visitors. Cartographers barely acknowledged its presence (or chose to ignore it altogether). And the first explorations, which …
It is the earth's final frontier. Antarctica, a gigantic mass of ocean-encased rocky islands south of the Antarctic Circle, is the earth's southern-most continent. There is no place colder or drier. Stark but majestic, uncompromisingly bleak but alluring, 98 per cent of the continent's 14 million kilometres (km) is sheathed …
A 1996 expert group report on the Indian Antarctic programme says: "The programme has so far been working in complete isolation with no substantial element of international cooperation. While actual attempts are being made by various countries through the aegis of SCAR (Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research) to join hands …
