Feature Article

Mining coal was once a livelihood for villagers in coal-rich states. Now, it is a multi-crore business for the coal mafia. While the mafia pocket crores, villagers get a few hundreds for mining coal illegally while the government gets nothing.

Reversing its earlier stand, a high level government committee said that domestic natural gas users cannot be asked to subsidise costlier imported LNG as pooling of natural gas prices was not feasible. An inter-ministerial panel headed by Planning Commission Member Saumitra Chaudhuri in its draft report a few months back had suggested averaging out price of costlier imported LNG with cheaper domestic gas.

India's coal demand will go up to 1,000 million tonnes (MT) by the end of the 12th Five Year Plan (2012-17), necessitating about 200 MT of imports to bridge the shortfall in domestic output, said a senior Planning Commission official.

Arguing that indiscriminate exploitation of mineral resources was leading to alienation amongst local tribal populations and furthering the cause of Naxalite groups, Minister for Tribal Affairs V Kishore Chandra Deo has advocated a ban on export of raw materials like iron ore or bauxite. Mineral resources like iron ore should be declared "national wealth" and their use must be regulated in the larger interest of the country, Deo said in an interview.

Karnataka has imposed Rs 140 crore in penalties on 13 iron ore mining companies in Tumkur for encroaching on government land and dumping mineral waste, thereby causing damage to the environment. "We have conducted a suo motu joint survey with the departments of mines and geology, forest and revenue in Tumkur district and found that 13 iron ore mining companies have violated the Karnataka Land Revenue Act, 1964, by dumping mineral waste on government land," C Somashekhar, deputy commissioner of Tumkur, said.

Anil Ambani's flagship power company does not want to stop at just being a leading power generator. It is aspiring to emerge as a leading coal miner as well. At a time when fuel linkage has been crippling growth plans for most of its peers, Reliance Power (R-Power) may soon rub shoulders with top coal producers of the world.

A cash-strapped Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation (UPPCL) has signed a one-year deal with a private power generator in Gujarat, routed through a private power trader in the western state, to buy some 600 MW at around Rs 4.70 a unit. The price is well above the average of less Rs 3 a unit on the power exchanges over the last two months.

India's largest iron ore miner Navaratna company NMDC is now on a shopping spree. It has been traversing the continents looking for precious mineral assets for use in India for some time now. As a part of this effort, NMDC has tied up with the Russian steel producer Severstal.

The Yorkshire village of Todmorden has taken local food to heart – and to the street. The planting of food crops at forty public locations throughout the village offer locals, and visitors, the chance to pick their own fresh fruit and vegetables, and it’s all free. From the local police station to the cemetery, from the health centre to the elderly care home (with raised garden beds at wheelchair height), in tubs on the street and in plots dug by the canal, Todmorden is embracing “local edible” with a passion.

With less than one percent of the world’s area, Nepal is home to a disproportionately large number of plant species. Yet large numbers of the population are food insecure, and hunger and malnutrition are prevalent. Statistics show that the situation has worsened during the past two decades. The worst-affected segments of the population are the tribal and nomadic communities, whose local agriculture and natural resource management systems are jeopardised by public and private programmes built around a high-external-input agriculture. Isn’t it time to try a different approach?