India’s Food Production Surge With Groundwater Is Unsustainable

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Lester R Brown, India's Dangerous 'Food Bubble;' Grain production is up, but wells are going dry from the unsustainable use of irrigation water. Los Angeles Times, Nov 29, 2013.
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/c ... ble-famine-20131129,0,4895563.story

Quote:

“India is now the world's third-largest grain producer after China and the United States [buttressed by overpumping groundwater].

“Although poverty has been reduced for some, two-thirds of the [India’s] population still live on less than $2 a day, according to the World Bank.

Note: “With a third of the US grain harvest now going to fuel for cars and another third going to feed livestock, U.S. exports are down.”
(a) US uses only corn to produce ethanol (Brazil uses sugar cane).
(b) corn is a grain. See food grain
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_grain
(section 1 Grains and cereals: In botany, grains and cereals are synonymous with caryopses)
(i) caryopsis (n; New Latin; First Known Use 1830):
“a small one-seeded dry indehiscent fruit (as of corn or wheat) in which the fruit and seed fuse in a single grain”)
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/caryopsis
(ii) caryopsis (n; early 19th century: from modern Latin, from Greek karuon 'nut' + opsis 'appearance')
http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/caryopsis