Britain battered by inch-wide hailstorms, Heathrow Airport sees warmest day in 12-years

Britain was battered by hailstorms with large size hailstones the size of coins pelting the north east of England with fierce lightning storms sweeping across the country following the sweltering heat in which temperatures reached up to 98F.
This has been reported in dailymail.co.uk dated 2 July 2015.

It was the hottest day in Britain and the rains swept through the north of the country overnight, with the wet weather predicted to become more widespread by this afternoon. There were lightning strikes hit the North Sea just off Saltburn-by-the-Sea.
The temperatures had gone to 36.7C (98.1F) at London Heathrow Airport making it to be the warmest day in the country for 12 years. This prompted health officials to warn people to stay out of the sun because it would become hotter than Barcelona and Athens.
Incidentally, tennis at Wimbledon had to be stopped after a ball boy fainted in the heat and over 170 spectators had to be treated at the All England Lawn Tennis Club by paramedics.
(Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org)

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Relaxed norms for growing wheat leaves FCI with 24m tonnes of poor quality stuff

The Food Corporation of India (FCI) is stuck with a major problem. It has procured 27 million tonnes of wheat so far this year and most of it was under relaxed norms. The norms had been relaxed by the government in order to help the farmers whose crops were hit in the unseasonal rain and hailstorm.
The good intentions of the government has created a problem for itself because the grains have a shorter shelf life and must be used in 8 to 10 months. Moreover, the grain is shrivelled, broken and lacks lustre.
This has been reported in timesofindia.indiatimes.com dated 29 June 2015.

While there is a need to protect the interest of farmers, the problem for FCI is how to offload the stock. It can distribute a maximum of 20 million tonnes through the PDS or Fair Price shops – the balance has to go in the open market but, who will buy substandard wheat at the official price.
The problem is confounded by the fact that the government has also allowed import of wheat and this wheat sells at cheaper price as compared to the FCI stock.
(Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org)

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