IRDA has asked the govt to continue with the scheme for at least seven years to assess the results before making any change. Under the proposed risk pool format, it is proposed to create a government-owned agency that will have the mandate to fix crop premiums and payouts. The participating insurance companies would be restricted only to administrative functioning against a fixed charge.
The MoS informed that all-India daily average retail price stood at Rs 101.35 per kg on Tuesday (December 10) as against Rs 55.95 per kg a month-ago and Rs 19.69 per kg a year-ago. As per Agriculture Ministry estimates, the storage of onion in 2017 and 2018 stood at 48.73 lakh tonnes and 50.05 Lakh tonnes, respectively.
IBM has launched a global high-resolution atmospheric forecasting system, IBM GRAF, saying more accurate weather forecasting can help governments and companies greatly improve their operations. IBM said GRAF can help bridge the gap between Indian forecasting system and global models.
Payment for damaged rice, cotton, oilseeds, pulses, sugarcane and horticulture crops will be paid under the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yoja in which a farmer contributes only 1.5% to 2% of the insurance cost and the balance is shared by the Centre and states. Officials have estimated payout of Rs 4,000 crore in MP, and Rs 1,000 crore to Rs 1,200 crore each in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.
Unseasonal rain in Karnataka, the biggest coffee producing state in the country, has hindered arabica coffee harvest, which normally starts by the end of November. 
The government sells pulses including tur and chana through ration shops at prices ranging between Rs 45-55 a kg. In retail market. the prices of tur, urad and chana are ruling between Rs 70-120 a kg. 
As many as 50 trucks laden with onion crossed over to India across Attari check post and 55 trucks had brought the tuber on Monday this week. The landed cost of onion from Afghanistan is Rs 40-55 per kg while the local crop is priced at Rs 65- 75 per kg and retail prices are hovering over Rs 100 per kg. The spurt in international supply has cooled down wholesale prices of onion by 20-30%, said traders.
At a meeting called by the Directorate General of Foreign Trade, traders assured officials that fears of foreign pests and disease impacting domestic onion crops due to relaxed phytosanitary norms were unfounded.
The rates were as high as Rs 165 a kg in Panaji, while the average of 114 major cities in the country came to over Rs 100, according to official data available here. Onion prices started to climb from September and have averaged over Rs 100 per kg since November 25.
Chandrashekhar Bhadsavle from Neral in Mumbai has developed a direct sowing technique called Saguna Rice Technology (SRT), which eliminates need of tillage and stubble burning in rice and other crops. Bhadsavle had developed the SRT technology of rice cultivation in 2011. 
Last week, govt had reduced the stock holding limit for retailers to 5 tonnes from 10 tonnes while that on wholesalers to 25 tonnes from 50 tonnes as onion prices were ruling high up to Rs 150 per kg. Retail onion prices have risen in the past two months due to short supply owing to fall in production of kharif (summer) crop after heavy rains. 
The long term irrigation fund was instituted under NABARD in 2016-17 under the 'Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchyee Yojana-Accelerated Irrigation Benefits Programme' that envisages bringing 76 lakh hectares under irrigation through 99 identified projects.
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee has instructed the state government’s supply chain and sales point known as Sufal Bangla to market onions at a maximum of Rs 59 per kg. The state government will not only subsidise the price of onion but also bear the cost of transportation, distribution and losses in transit.
Nitin Gadkari said the government was focussed on diversification of agriculture into energy and power, and industry must also invest in rural and agricultural sectors to create employment and diversify wealth generation. He said pollution of the air and water, and India’s crude oil import bill, and agricultural crisis were the country’s three major problems today.
Traders said they had not foreseen such an acute scarcity of onion, which happened mainly because of heavy rain. They said farmers were harvesting pre-mature onion to benefit from present high rates. Though onion prices are at their historic highs, it has barely helped many farmers recover past year's losses and get decent returns this year.
Kashmir’s Agriculture department has also approached University of Agriculture Sciences and Technology in Srinagar, asking them to submit a report on types of sweet corn varieties that could be grown in Kashmir. For now, the department imports sweet corn seed variety from Holland.
Onion prices have been ruling high for past few weeks due to fall in production of the Kharif crop following unseasonal rainfall in key growing states, including Maharashtra. The price of onion was ruling at around Rs 120/kg in Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata, while it was around Rs 100/kg in Delhi on Friday, as per the latest data.
India, the world’s second most populous nation, has already been grappling with the impact of climate change. This year’s monsoon, which typically waters more than half of the country’s total farmland, caused floods and poor rains at the same time.
Nirmala Sitharaman recently asked states to scrap APMCs and join eNAM to help farmers get better price realisation of their produce. APMC is a marketing board meant to moderate prices and prevent big traders from exploiting farmers. Officials said business transactions are growing and more than 150 commodities are being traded on the electronic platform.
The consumer affairs department has also directed MMTC to issue three more tenders for import of Onions, out of which two tenders are country specific namely Turkey and European Union and one is a global tender. Each of these tenders are for 5,000 tonnes.
