Machine or Manual: Observations from Cotton Sowing

The ongoing sowing season has led to updating my priors about use of machine power on farms. It came about from our decision to grow cotton on three plots of four acres each. The following set of observations apply to small-scale farming (<5 hectares) only. This is not about cultivating at large scale. Instead of …

Who cares for MSP? A review of our winter growing season, 2022-23

December 2022 It started well. There were lovely views of farms with rows of fresh green saplings all through December and January. We sowed wheat on a 3.5 acre plot and gram (chickpea/chana) on 9 acres. From a cropping area of under 3.5 acres, 10 quintals of wheat was harvested. From a cropping area of …

Lessons for the future: Covid-19, Preparedness & Research

BIC, May 2023 Covid-19 is no longer a public health emergency of international concern. This announcement by the WHO has received little attention. But, this is how the Covid-19 saga ends officially. This week at the BIC a panel of public health professionals and clinicians reflected on lessons from COVID-19 pandemic. It had two clinicians …

Tata Mumbai Marathon 2023

The city and runners were excited that TMM is back after a gap of two years. While I had done a few 50Ks and ultras in the pandemic years, a marathon distance was missing. Besides, this is the only occasion when I have bothered with finishing time. Signed up and began a recover and rebuild …

Bangalore Ultra 100K

In the last two years the quantum of running and cycling long distance has been low. Life has been around the city and the farms back home. In the interim a few long road trips happened. But motorized world is half as exciting as that of human-powered mobility. The proposition of covering 100 KM on …

Working Time and Work-Life Balance – Insights for policy?

ILO published a report on Working Time and Work-Life Balance Around the World. The chart on average hours of work per week across various geographic regions has been widely circulated in the Indian media. South Asians work the most hours per week with a total of 51.5 hours. East Asians follow closely with 49.4 hours …

ChatGPT and Public Policy

ChatGPT will disrupt verbose, dull and formulaic disciplines like public policy. Professions and academic disciplines that thrive on producing text-heavy reports that sound vaguely analytical and insightful might find their work getting easier with ChatGPT. The chatbot, described as a large language model in its current form is ready to take over lower end of …

India’s farming and carbon credit market

Meet the farmer with whom India's farming enters carbon credit market (Livemint) profiles a farmer from Punjab with 65 acres of landholding. He grows rice using the direct-seeded rice (DSR) method. The method reduces labour cost because transplanting of saplings as well as puddling is not involved in DSR method. He is saving on irrigation …

Roundup 2022

Morning light. Ajangaon, November, 2022. The year was marked by rapid changes month-on-month. Many of these, as I reflect now, will have long term impact personally and how I might spend professional time in the future. Like 2021, this year too went by rather quickly. It helps to have highly active parents who have an …

Notes from the AGRF Summit 2022, Rwanda – 1

In the first week of September, 2022 I traveled to Kigali, Rwanda for the AGRF Summit 2022. It was not too long back that I came across a continent-wide initiative called the Africa Green Revolution Forum (AGRF). This appeared to be a useful forum to participate and gain a sense of national-level issues, debates and …