"This reflects the chronic lack of balanced food," said Ashish Agarwal, a food rights activist with Aligarh-based non-profit group UDAAN Society that focuses on rural development. "The under-5 mortality rate is 4.8 percent in India, partially because of inadequate nutrition and unhealthy environment. "A small quantity of good quality rice is mixed with rotten portion to increase the volume and sold to us at subsidy. "Sagheer Ahmed, professor at the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences, Aligarh Muslim University, said a lack of storage was the main reason for wasted food grain along with no concrete system for processing perishable fruits and vegetables. "There is also a huge communication gap between farmers and scientists and ... they fail to benefit from the technologies developed by us."

Source: Economic Times January 04, 2018 01:52 UTC