Feeling the heat of climate change

Key sector: More than 250 million people in India, or nearly half of all workers, are employed in agriculture and related sectors. — Bloomberg

Farmer Ganpatram Bheda, 66, fears he will lose his two acres of land in northwest India after scarce rainfall and extreme cold in recent years hit crop yields, trapping him in a web of loans with little help from the state to overcome his financial woes.

As small-scale Indian farmers like Bheda grapple with growing climate uncertainties, researchers this week called for a robust rural jobs scheme, crop insurance and mental healthcare to ease growing distress and suicide in agrarian communities.