Not just tomatoes.

"The world's most populous nation is more poorly endowed with farmland per capita than Greece or Algeria," wrote David Fickling. "India recently suspended exports of non-Basmati varieties of rice after heavy monsoon damaged crops that were due to be harvested in winter." Tomatoes were selling at Rs 200 per kg in Mumbai last weekend, prompting some stalls to close as there were no buyers. ET. Some farmers have sold their crops for over Rs 10 million as crops have been destroyed by excessive rains in other regions creating a shortage. ET. It is only just that profits should go to farmers. India is behind on transition to electric vehicles, because of shortage of charging facilities, and on renewable energy. "The government is running ahead of its 10% ethanol blending mandate and looks on track to hit 20% rate by 2025 as it seeks to trim its oil transport bill." But, "Sugarcane is a thirsty crop which needs a whole year or more to grow to maturity." Pulse cultivation has fallen by 0.8%. "According to HSBC Holdings Plc, the widespread cereal shortages in India could drive inflation higher in the country, even though the shock from vegetable prices is expected to ease." ET. "Costs of food items ranging from chilly to staples including pulses and rice, consumed by crores of people, are singeing Indians, who in any case have been shelling out more than Rs 100 per liter of petrol in many parts of the country." "It is clear that no country will suffer more from climate change this century than India, but no country is going to see its emissions grow faster over the coming decade," wrote Fickling. But how to reduce our emissions. "Electric vehicles (EV) don't run on fossil fuels," but the electricity required to charge these vehicles is largely produced from fossil fuels. "Further, in 2010-11, the country's generation capacity that depended on coal stood at 54%. It was down to 53% in 2020-21. In absolute terms, coal-based power capacity jumped from 93,918 megawatts to 202,675 megawatts," wrote Vivek Kaul. Electric cars and their batteries need a large number of minerals whose extraction and refining produce a lot of greenhouse gases. "The metals used both for ICE (internal combustion engine) vehicles and battery-electric ones make up 53% and 47% of the manufacturing carbon footprint according to the Greenpeace report," wrote Anjani Trivedi. China controls most of the essential minerals for manufacturing EVs. "China's Vital Material Co bought up a $600 million stockpile of obscure critical materials in early 2020," and now "holds the biggest share of the markets for selenium, tellurium, indium and bismuth" and is "in the top three for gallium and germanium." ET. Meanwhile, "Tata Sons plans to build a four-billion-pound ( about Rs 423 billion) electric vehicle factory in the UK." TOI. The British government has offered 500 million pounds worth of incentives "a figure that may turn out to be conservative once the full extent of support is known," wrote Matthew Brooker. We need renewable energy and EVs to reduce emissions, but the manufacture of these need fossil fuels. Looks difficult, like squaring the circle.