India's farming crisis deepens as climate change fuels rise in farmer suicides
On a small farm in
India 's Maharashtra state, Mirabai Khindkar said the only thing her land grew was debt, after crops failed in drought and her husband killed himself.
Farmer suicides have a long history in India, where many are one crop failure away from disaster, but
extreme weather caused by climate change is adding fresh pressure.
Dwindling yields due to water shortages, floods, rising temperatures and erratic rainfall, coupled with crippling debt, have taken a heavy toll on a sector that employs 45 per cent of India's 1.4 billion people.
Mirabhai's husband Amol was left with debts to loan sharks worth hundreds of times their farm's annual income after the three-acre (one-hectare) soybean, millet and cotton plot withered in the scorching heat.
He swallowed poison last year.
'When he was in the hospital, I prayed to all the gods to save him,' Mirabai said, her voice breaking.
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