Farmers in Sri Lanka's Hambantota struggle to keep crops alive without effective fertilisers, with rampaging elephants — displaced due to ill-conceived infra projects — posing another threat.
Sri Lanka has distributed consignment of nano urea fertiliser imported from India for paddy cultivation. There was a lot of anger among farmers over the earlier ban.
A Sri Lankan bank withheld payment to China’s Qingdao Seawin Group after its fertiliser samples were allegedly found to host harmful bacteria. China has now blacklisted the bank.
President Gotabaya Rajapaksa was forced to impose an economic emergency on 31 August to contain soaring food inflation, and currency devaluation and forex reserves crisis.
Chinese farmers are ditching chemical agriculture for reasons of personal health, ecological protection and economic motives, propped up state support.
Pressure for less chemical-intensive farming methods is coming from retailers like Walmart, who are throwing more dollars toward organic foods with environmental claims.
A UK study finds that while direct emissions might come down, increased use of land to produce the same amount of food will cause emissions to rise by 21%.
Israel's response to Iran's retaliatory attack was relatively small and also downplayed by Tehran. But there are factors that could jeopardise this perceived reprieve.
The 125 APAs include 86 Unilateral APAs (UAPAs) and 39 Bilateral APAs (BAPAs). The total number of APAs since the start of the APA programme has risen to 641, with 506 UAPAs and 135 BAPAs.
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