Land and freedom

Poor Indian farmers called on the British government last week to halt plans for spending £65 million “developing” their farms. The Indian state of Andhra Pradesh claims that a British-backed programme called Vision 2020 will “totally eradicate poverty” by bringing genetically modified cotton and rice crops, irrigation, roads and electricity to poor rural communities. But the farmers, backed by researchers from the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex, claim it will create poverty by throwing up to 20 million poor farm labourers out of work.