Upgradation of district hospital in Madikeri is going on full swing. The state government has sanctioned Rs 3 crores for the various development works.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> Speed News / by Manu Aiyappa, Bangalore / June 12th, 2013
The Coffee Board announced establishing the Coffee Entrepreneurship Centre in Bangalore in order to sustain the coffee cafe culture in India. The Chairman of Coffee Board, Jawaid Akhtar explained that the idea came up because of rapid growth of coffee cafes as well as parlours in India, especially in the non-traditional (non-coffee growing States) areas. However, there is a dearth of manpower in these areas.
The primary objective of the Coffee Entrepreneurship Centre is to create the manpower base. This base would be created by facilitating training to people scientifically and providing them the knowledge about specialty coffees.
Also the objective is creation of the manpower in various levels of coffee business such as setting of roast and ground (R&G) outlets as well as coffee retailing. This will also assist the entrepreneurs in establishing as well as operating the cafes with the formal training.
In order to facilitate the educational support, the Coffee Board also roped in Indian Institute of Plantation Management (IIPM). The Coffee Entrepreneurship Centre is infact housed in the IIPM campus of Bangalore.
The Centre will provide lab-scale experience to people in making espresso coffee, traditional brewing, grinding coffee as well as roasting. The Board will make use of the faculty at IIPM in order to run the courses. At present, there are approximately 2200 coffee cafes in India which are operated by the big companies like Barista, Costa and Café Coffee Day.
The Coffee Entrepreneurship Centre will have one-month courses on How to start coffee businesses as well as How to make different coffees.
Coffee Board gave grant of 30 lakh Rupees in order to set up this centre.
source: http://www.jagranjosh.com / Jagran Josh / Home> English / June 13th, 2013
Folk arts in Kodagu district are on the verge of losing its identity. There is a need to conserve it. All of us have a responsibility to conserve folk culture, said Karnataka Janapada Parishat president T Thimme Gowda.
Speaking at a meeting organised by Janapada Parishat, he said that Kodagu was known for its rich legacy of folklores. “However, we are facing threat of losing it. Awareness on folk culture should be created among youth who are aping western culture. There is a need to document folk culture. The Parishat has plans to collect information on folklores,” he said.
To protect the culture and lifestyle of Kodava and Arebhashe traditional dwellers in Kodagu district, the parishat district unit will be set up.
Lecturer Dr Sridhar Hegde said that there was a need to document dialects of different languages, to help the future generation.
Dr J Somanna said that folk teams should be trained.
Ramanagara Janapada Trust Managing Trustee Indira Balakrishna said that folk was not only an art form. “There is a need to make an in-depth study on the lifestyle and food habits of the people of the region.”
source: http://www.deccanherald.com / Deccan Herald / Home> District / Madkikeri – DHNS / June 09th, 2013
Smile Foundation, a national level development organisation, along with fashion guru Prasad Bidapa put up the 4th edition of Ramp For Champs recently .
The event started with a special performance by the students of William Joseph International Academy for Performing Arts on one of its kind classical guitar orchestra .
Throwing light on the show, Bidapa said, “This show was conceptualised with an aim to reach out to more and more privileged people for a cause. I am glad that so many eminent personalities are associated with us. I would like to thank all the people who took time out from their tight schedules and came to support us.”
Speaking on the occasion, the chief guest for the evening, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Member of Parliament, said “Education is the most powerful weapon you can use to change the world is what Nelson Mandela said. So, education is the weapon that girl children and women need to change the still widely held, restrictive view on opportunities for them. I am happy to be a part of Ramp for Champ initiative.”
He further added, “Education is every child’s right and through the funds raised today, we intend to send 1000 children to school. However, we still believe there are thousands more who need similar support and encouragement. ”
Celebrities like, Sudha Murty-author, Vani Ganapathi- classical dancer, choreographer and designer, Priyanka Upendera- actress, Tara – actress, Nisha Millet – national level swimmer, Ashley Williams – chairman of William Joseph Music Foundation and director and conductor of Indian National Symphony Orchestra , Ramesh Arvind – actor, Aviva Bidapa – super model, Rubi Chakravarti – entertainment professional, Nadira Iqbal – fashion designer and entrepreneur also supported the cause.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> Cities> Bangalore / Express Features – Bangalore / June 10th, 2013
Hameed Huq of Tata Coffee told CNBC-TV18 that he expected an increase in their production of Arabica crop by 30 percent. However, he anticipated a flat growth in its Robusta crop.
Tata Coffee expects its Arabica crop production to increase 30 percent this year, while it aims to maintain Robusta production at last year’s levels in FY14.
Robusta variety of coffee accounts for 70 percent of the company’s total production, while Arabica accounts for 30 percent, Hameed Huq, managing director, told CNBC-TV18.
In company’s standalone accounts, 20 percent revenues are from plantations while 55-60 percent is from instant coffee production.
Since a majority of its revenues are from instant coffee production, Huq said that the fall in raw coffee prices would only benefit the company.
Also read: How industries fared in April 2013: CARE Research
Below is the edited transcript of his interview to CNBC-TV18.
Q: Reports indicate that coffee output in India could suffer due to inconsistent rains at the start of the year. Could you throw some light on the coffee output for the entire seasons? What will the prices be?
A: On coffee output, we harvest Arabica first and then go on to Robusta. We are looking at almost 30 percent increase in Arabica production over the previous year.
Last year, there was an acute drought across most of Karnataka which impacted the crop. We are not seeing that. On Robusta growth, we are looking at maintaining last year’s levels. We had a very large crop last year which again is reflective of the general industry.
The crop will not be lower next year. In fact, it definitely should be higher than harvest in the season that ended.
Q: You are dependent on 70 percent of your raw material needs on Robusta. Have the prospects for that improved with the rates?
A: I will cover that in two things. In Tata Coffee , 70 percent of our plantation is Robusta and 30 percent is Arabica. We had a very good Arabica crop last year. The Robusta prices have not slid as much as Arabica.
If you look at Tata Coffee’s standalone accounts, plantation coffee constitutes less that 20 percent of our turnover. Over 56-60 percent of our turnover actually comes from instant coffee.
To that extent, whether coffee prices are moving slightly, easing up, doesn’t really impact Tata Coffee anymore because it is not totally a coffee plantation company.
However, overall also the coffee plantation is doing well, but there has been easing of prices.
Q: What is the percentage of your expenses accounted by raw materials?
A: If you look at our consolidated accounts, 83-85 percent of our turnover is based on green coffee being purchased out.
If there is any easing in prices, it adds to the business and its margins. Within the space of instant coffee, anything between 65-70 percent cost is related to green coffee.
So, when you see this easing of prices, generally it is favourable to Tata Coffee, not the other way round.
Q: You closed FY13 with a margin improvement due to benign raw material prices. How are you expecting margins to pan out in FY14? Can we expect some further improvement? Any guidance or target that you could help us with?
A: We don’t give guidance. But if you look at the basic fundamentals, we are largely driven on two of our major businesses by green coffee prices. Both of them have softened.
We have just commissioned an expansion program at Theni where our instant coffee plant exists and the capacity is going up by 30 percent. The plantation has gone on stream for the same.
source: http://www.moneycontrol.com / Moneycontrol> News> Business / CNBC TV18 / June 10th, 2013
The long pending project, would help many, when completed
The work on underpass which will provide connectivity to district hospital and women and children’s ward of the hospital is in full swing.
The hospital is situated on one side of the road and the women and children’s wing of the hospital is situated on another side of the state highway near General Thimmaiah Circle.
Hundreds of vehicles ply on Mysore road between district hospital and women and childrens’ ward.
The patients and the public were finding it difficult in crossing the road between the hospital and the ward. With the completion of the underpass, the public can cross without any problem.
The public were demanding an underpass for the past several years. About 80 per cent of the work has been completed.
When the work on widening of Mysore-Madikeri-Sampje road was taken up, the KRDCL had submitted a proposal to construct an underpass two years ago.
The work on underpass has been taken up by the Karnataka State Road Development Corporation.
The KRDCL had completed the work on underpass. The remaining work is being taken up at a cost of Rs 92 lakh by the health department. The government has already released Rs 68 lakh to complete the work.
The pending work will be completed and the underpass will be inaugurated at the earliest, said health department engineering division chief engineer Prabhakar.
source: http://www.deccanherald.com / Deccan Herald / Home> District / by Srikanth Kallammanavar, DHNS / June 09th, 2013
From being an underdog to Indian team vice-captain, Raghunath has come a long way.
Most sportspersons would tell you that any sport – even if it is one of the most physical – eventually has a lot to do with the mind. India’s dragflick specialist, VR Raghunath, is no exception.
Despite being part of the illustrious list of hockey players from Coorg in Karnataka, Raghunath has had his fair share of struggles early on in his career, failing to find a regular place in the senior national team. That was until Michael Nobbs took him under his wings. Raghunath then became part of the 2012 London Olympics, and is now the vice-captain of the team.
So how did it all change for 24-year-old? “I wasn’t mentally confident about myself before. Nobbs worked on my mental strength and brought my inner game out,” Raghunath told dna before the squad departed to The Netherlands for the FIH Men’s World League Round 3 (semifinals) starting on June 13.
“Thus, I’ve also been given a leadership role to support Sardar (Singh). I’m enjoying the responsibility and hope to motivate the juniors that come in.”
Talking of juniors, India fielded a young side for the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup earlier this year, and the team going for the World League also has a lot of young faces like Mandeep Singh and Manpreet Singh. Raghunath believes that the current crop of youngsters is the best India ever had.
“It’s a transformation period after the 2012 London Olympics. And because of the Hockey India League, we’re getting a lot of good talent. I think our present junior team is one of the best we’ve had over the past few years,” he said.
Raghunath is equally elated with the comeback of ace dragflicker Sandeep Singh. “Sandeep is one of the most experienced players and he knows how to play in high-intensity games. So it’s great that we can rotate our three dragflickers and have at least two penalty corner specialists on the field at a time,” he added.
Raghunath hopes the team rises to the occasion during this key tournament, which is a qualification for the FIH Men’s World Cup in 2014.
“We had a good three-week camp in Bangalore, so our preparation has been great. I prefer to take it one match at a time, and going all out in that. We hope to start well and if we do, I’m sure we can end it well,” he said.
source: http://www.dnaindia.com / DNA / Home> Sports> Report / by Rutvick Mehta / Place:Mumbai, Agency:DNA / Thursday – June 06th, 2013
Coffee planters should think twice before using chemical fertilisers and pesticides. More emphasis has been given to environment and bio-diversity in the international market, said NABARD General Manager C P Appanna.
He was speaking after inaugurating a workshop on ‘Quality improvement, value addition and importance of butterfly rearing in coffee production’, organised jointly by Institute for Social and Economic Change (ISEC), Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI), Oslo, Agricultural University, Bangalore , Kodagu Krishi Vijnanigala Vedike, Swastha organisation and Chai Kadai, Bangalore in Madikeri recently.
“We have been growing coffee in a conducive environment in Kodagu. However, coffee from Kodagu is not getting good price in the international market. At the same time, we must get certified from an international agency on the quality of the product, to get better price for coffee,” he said.
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“By rearing butterflies, we need to establish the fact that no environment hazard activities have been carried out in the coffee estates. Many western countries refused to import agriculture products from India, owing to chemical content found in it,” he added.
He gave a clarion call to the farmers to adopt organic farming.
source: http://www.deccanherald.com / Deccan Herald / Home> District / Madikeri,DHNS – June 06th, 2013
In October, Madrira Ganapathy, a rice and coffee grower in South Coorg, Karnataka, was told by doctors that he had four arterial blocks, all of them above 85 per cent, around his heart. He had to undergo surgery quickly. The following month, he got himself admitted at Fortis Cauvery Heart Hospital in Mysore and underwent surgery successfully.
The operation cost Rs 1.5 lakh but Ganapathy, who earns about Rs 60,000 a year from farming his four acres of land, did not have to pay. Why so? His bill was settled by Yeshasvini Trust, a non-profit organisation under the Karnataka government which runs a micro health insurance scheme for rural folk.
“I am not a BPL (below poverty line) card holder but, at the same time, I could not have afforded a surgery like this. The scheme is of big help to people like me,” says Ganapathy, 48, who has been part of Yeshasvini for five years. “I am now asking my friends also to enrol in the scheme.”
Yeshasvini was launched in June 2003 and now covers about three million people in the state. It is open to all income groups in rural areas, provided the applicant has been a member of any cooperative society for at least six months. It costs Rs 210 a year per family member and covers 805 surgeries in 446 network hospitals.
The hospitals offer medical consultation for free and diagnostic facilities at a discount. In cases involving hospitalisation, the trust clears the bill via a third party administrator. In 2011/12, Yeshasvini Trust settled bills worth Rs 60.27 crore against 77,738 surgeries.
Besides, as many as 116,000 people were treated as outpatients. Since the scheme’s inception, the trust has paid Rs 412 crore for 469,000 surgeries. “We expect the outgo to hospitals to be around Rs 90 crore in 2012/13 because of the increase in hospital charges from April 1,” says Yeshasvini Trust CEO R.M. Nataraja. The trust is largely self-funded – it will mobilise about Rs 60 crore in premiums this year while the government pays Rs 40 crore.
“Yeshasvini is the first insurance programme in the world to coin the term micro health insurance, and its success is because poor people trust only the government,” says eminent heart surgeon Dr Devi Prasad Shetty, Chairman of Narayana Hrudayalaya, and a member of Yeshasvini Trust. “This is the greatest advantage the government enjoys as a large scale health insurance provider.”
The biggest success of Yeshasvini, however, is in proving that, with just about Rs 17 per person a month, it is possible to run a massive, sustainable health insurance programme. “Yeshasvini has demonstrated a model that works with the willing participation of the beneficiaries,” says G.V. Krishna Rau, Chairman of the trust, and Principal Secretary, Department of Cooperation, Karnataka. “The challenge now is to take this forward by enlarging its scope and making it a universal scheme.”
The model has inspired other states such as Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh to start similar programmes. In April 2008, the Centre launched the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana, a health insurance scheme for BPL card holders which covers costs up to Rs 30,000. In late 2011, the Maharashtra government introduced the Rajiv Gandhi Jeevandayee Arogya Yojana covering about 490,000 people in eight districts.
According to programme officer Mukesh Mohode, the Maharashtra government paid a premium of Rs 180 crore to Kolkata-based National Insurance Company for coverage of these districts. The scheme provides a family floater cover of Rs 1.5 lakh a year covering 972 procedures, including cancer treatment. For kidney transplants the scheme provides up to Rs 2.5 lakh. The scheme, unlike the Yeshasvini plan, is fully funded by the state government and the beneficiaries do not have to pay any premium. Maharashtra aims to extend the scheme to all districts in two to three months.
While the Yeshasvini plan is for rural families, the Jeevandayee scheme benefits both BPL and above poverty line (APL) people (but only up to those with a maximum income of Rs 1 lakh a year) in urban areas as well. One of its recent beneficiaries is Sadhna Dattaram Sawant, a 71-year-old widow who lives in Mumbai’s Parel with her son who does not hold a regular job. She holds an orange ration card, given to people with annual income below Rs 1 lakh. Sawant had been suffering from kidney and cardiac ailments and needed a renal angioplasty to help increase blood supply to her left kidney. This would help solve her hypertension and reduce chances of a heart attack.
On November 26, doctors at the King Edward Memorial (KEM) hospital, run by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation, conducted Sawant’s angioplasty. Sitting on her hospital bed the following day, wearing a hospital-issued white dress, Sawant looked happy. “I thought I would be lying in bed for a long time. I am so happy I am able to walk around a day after the procedure,” she said.
Sandhya Kamath, Dean at KEM, says the hospital has so far handled about 1,700 cases under this scheme. Hemant Deshmukh, the doctor who conducted Sawant’s procedure, says his department alone takes up at least seven or eight similar cases under the scheme every month. “The procedure would have cost Rs 50,000 at King Edward and Rs 1 lakh at a private hospital,” he says. “Under the scheme, the cost to the patient is zero.”
source: http://www.businesstoday.intoday.in / Business Today / Home> Archives> Business Today> Cover Today / by K.R. Balasubramanyam and Sumar Layak / January 06th, 2013
A hundred years of cinema were celebrated with style, grace and elegance during a recent fashion show by Manish Malhotra, in association with Styletag.com. The show displayed the timelessness and unique style of Indian movies. Many members of the fashion industry were spotted having a good time at the event. Among them were Prasad Bidappa, Radha Thomas and Ramji Chandran.
From popular polka-dots to flowing chiffon saris, the collection had it all. Manish’s creations were not all that the evening included — there was a lot more in store. Great music and an art auction were also a part of the show. City-based band ‘One Nite Stand’ added a lot of glamour and energy to the evening. The band played an eclectic mix of old retro numbers as well as jazz and rock for the audience.
The fashion show was the highlight of the evening, with the models sashaying down the ramp in beautiful saris and glittering full-length anarkalis in beautiful pastel shades. The designs showcased in the men’s collection were classy and chic. Chequered black and white waistcoats as well as bright silk sherwanis, kurtas and bandhgalas with fancy dupattas were showcased.
The gorgeous sari collection stole the show. The designs were indigenous and the colours were contemporary. The pastel collection of saris was stylish and lit up the ramp as soon as the models entered wearing them. “I loved the lime-green sari trimmed with red lace. It was elegant and yet contemporary. Manish’s collection is brilliant. We can see hints of Bollywood in it and it has something for everyone. He is a style icon in the truest sense,” says Ayesha, who attended the .
source: http://www.deccanherald.com / Deccan Herald / Home> Supplements> MetroLife / DHNS – Bangalore / June 04th, 2013
