Letter

Oil jitters

Apropos the Editorial ‘Ides of March’ (March 10), rise in crude oil prices is sending jitters to the global economy. Israel’s bombing of Iran’s oil wells worsened the situation destroying the structures and supply lines.

The closing of the Hormuz strait is aggravating the situation. Retail prices of LPG for domestic and commercial consumers have gone up since last week. Curtailing the supply of natural gas to industrial consumers would have serious impacts on the economy.

Panic booking for refills by domestic consumers forced the oil companies to implement a three weeks waiting time. Many hotels in Bengaluru and in TN have announced shutting down their outlets for two days in a week to tide over the situation.

A small cut in excise duty on fuels would help in keeping the market price of fuel under control.

RV Baskaran

Pune

Farmers’ woes

With reference to the article ‘Focus area of farm reforms’ (March 10), despite numerous agricultural reforms, farmers, particularly small, marginal, and landless cultivators, are still in debt. Measures must be taken to step up farm productivity and also mitigate the impact of climate change.

Farmers must be encouraged to cultivate soil-friendly and water-efficient crops.

Consumers must be nudged to shift their food preference to pulses, nutritious millets and vegetables. The demand for paddy and wheat across the country needs to be curtailed to encourage cultivators to cultivate lower-input cost varieties.

Despite access to credit, a sizeable portion of farmers aren’t utilising the bank credit facilities and are dependent on the indigenous money lenders.

The government must ensure a seamless flow of institutional credit to these segments.

VSK Pillai

Changanacherry

Coconut oil preference

Apropos ‘Centre mulls coconut oil ….. benefit farmers, users” (March 8). This does not look like a prudent idea for the main reason that coconut oil use is limited to few geographical areas.

Secondly, with rampant misuse of items distributed through ration shops, like rice, dal etc., coconut oil may face the same fate. Government must tighten norms so that PDS scheme is used only by the needy as rice meant for Anna Bhagya is seen sold in truck loads to bulk consumers. There are better ways to help coconut growers.

Rajiv Magal

Halekere Village, (Karnataka)

Published on March 10, 2026