The aim of this paper is to identify opportunities to strengthen food system policy for nutrition, through an analysis of the policies relevant to the external food environment for fruit and vegetables in India. We conducted interviews based on policy theory with 55 stakeholders from national and state level, from within government, research, private sector and non-government agencies, and from health, agriculture and economic sectors.

Economic development and the successful transformation ofagriculture have been at the core of impressive change in countriessuch as China, India, Indonesia, Brazil, Mexico, and Argentina. This transformation has relied on substantial and effective investment inagriculture, and, in particular, building capacity in all aspects of agricultural change – from technology development and transfer through infrastructural development and the processing of agricultural commodities into consumer products.

This study was taken up to understand the training gaps and training needs of the agricultural stakeholders such as public, private extension officials and farmers in Tamil Nadu. The data were collected using pre tested well-structured questionnaire from public and private extension officials and using semi-structured interview schedule in case of farmers. The results show that training gaps are relatively higher among public extension officials than private extension officials.

For better efforts in development of the farming community, agricultural extension services have always focused on farmers’ resources, activities and capabilities. And this has proved to be an important standing point in the rice growing state Tripura of North East India for attaining self-sufficiency in food grain and developing the economic condition of the farmers. System of Rice Intensification (SRI) has been a boon to the rice farmers and also has posed as an example especially in similar other conditions around the world.

Women empowerment through increasing the access of resources in local situation is the highlighted issue in the present context. Women involve in different types of activities in agricultural sphere and shoulder the responsibility in playing the roles of different actors in agricultural innovation system. The dimension of agricultural innovation always prefers to go along with the concepts of the dynamics around different activities and roles that poor women communities engaging towards addressing their social and economic needs through agricultural production system.

WhatsApp sends real-time messages and is one of the world’s most popular communication applications in the 21st century. The present study highlights and examines the domestication of WhatsApp among farmers. An exhaustive whatsapp user list was prepared from each village and 3 farmers were selected with the help of systematic sampling technique. Thus, 90 farmers from the 3 blocks of the district using whatsapp were purposively selected and grouped for sending the messages of agricultural aspects. The study was conducted at Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Neemuch during 2016-17.

Although many smallholder communities are yet to embark on their journey towards gender empowerment, this report presents best practice examples which demonstrate that significant strides can be achieved in relatively short time periods. Women’s Coffee initiatives are engaging consumers about the role of women in coffee production, and providing additional premiums that fund projects targeted at women, such as the projects implemented by UNICAFEC in Peru and Soppexcca in Nicaragua.

The farming systems followed by farmers in Asia, Africa and Latin America have the potential to deal with the problems thrown up by climate change. This article examines the changing drought ecosystems of poor farmers and also points out that the present paradigm of agricultural development and what it means for small farmers needs to be critically evaluated. Droughts in 2016 affected a quarter of the Indian population (2,55,923 villages in 254 districts in 10 states). Debates over drought preparedness and development priorities have been widespread.

This chapter analyses the access to and adequacy of formal sources in meeting the credit needs, particularly agricultural credit needs, of small farmers in India with the help of banking data, and data on the borrowing profiles of these households collected through the village surveys of the Project on Agrarian Relations in India (PARI).Three major institutions provide formal credit in the rural areas of India today: commercial banks, regional rural banks (RRBs), and credit cooperatives.

Market access determines the income of agricultural households and incentivizes the cultivation of diverse crops. Markets in India are mostly unorganized with limited infrastructure limiting their ability to cater to quality requirements and specifications demanded by urban consumers. Therefore, parallel to traditional markets, direct linkages with farms and alternative markets based on electronic sales platforms, new commodity futures and warehousing systems are needed.