The Asian Star - 18 October, 2025

VOL 25 - ISSUE 36

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The Truth behind India’s hunger: Abundance doesn’t mean food security On September 29, the world observed the International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste – a reminder that food security is not just about how much we grow, but how much we save. For India, this message is particularly urgent. We are a food-surplus nation, producing record quantities of grains, fruits and vegetables each year. Yet millions of Indians still cannot access a nutritious diet, and the country consistently ranks poorly on the Global Hunger Index.

The paradox of overflowing granaries alongside empty stomachs is not a story of inadequate production. It is a story of losses and leakages in the food system, where crops are squandered in fields, along roadsides, and in warehouses before they

reach a plate. We now grow enough to feed our population, but much of this food never reaches the people who need it most.

Globally, discussions around food often focus on consumer-level waste: oversized portions, half-eaten plates in restaurants and homes, or discarded supermarket produce.

Continued on Page 14...

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Housing affordability improving across Canada, but Vancouver remains least affordable: report

Housing affordability is improving across Canada, including in B.C., but the Vancouver area remains the least-affordable market, according to a report from RBC, Canada’s largest bank.

Continued on Page 7...

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A number of real estate experts see a rumbling storm on the horizon for Vancouver’s condo market, one that's been brewing since 2022. According to the Canadian Mortgage Housing Corporation (CMHC), around 2,500 condos are sitting vacant in Metro Vancouver, double the amount from a year ago. Why? A flurry of reasons have been suggested by those in the know. Anne McMullin, president and CEO of Urban Development Institute, told CBC News (1) that residents are moving in as condos cost more to build than nearly 80% of Metro Vancouver residents can afford.

Developers on the other hand, are in a pinch — they don’t want to lose money on a condo sale, but also can’t sit with a vacant unit either.

As a result, McMullin revealed how some developers have been giving consumers their deposits back because they aren’t meeting presale targets.

Continued on Page 7...

US may be ready for a trade deal with India now The United States appears ready to fast‑track a bilateral trade deal with India, driven by the need to diversify supply chains away from China and secure access to critical inputs.

According to GTRI director Ajay Srivastava, tightening Chinese controls on rare‑earth exports and an intensifying US–China trade conflict have “forced Washington to rethink its strategy with allies as it seeks reliable partners to build alternative supply chains.” He added that this shift “could accelerate a trade deal with India, with the US likely offering 16–18% tariff access-higher than the 15% for the EU and Japan but below the 20% for Vietnam.” A swift agreement would help unwind recently imposed US tariffs-up to 50%-that have squeezed Indian exporters.

Continued on Page 16...

3rd shooting at Kapil Sharma's Cafe

Surrey's surge in extortion-related violence 'a national crisis' The café is one of several businesses targeted in a wave of extortion-related violence in Surrey.

Police say more than half of the 65 extortion cases reported in the city in 2025 have involved shootings. Seven charges have been laid.

A former top business leader says she’s watched as the crimes have escalated in the past two years, which she calls “a national crisis” with economic and public safety implications.

“It’s absolutely unacceptable,” said Anita Huberman, who served as CEO of the Surrey

Board of Trade for close to three decades before stepping down last year. “It’s not a matter of giving up because it’s an internationally connected crime.

It’s about making it a priority for the federal government.”

As more cases were reported, Huberman said business owners began to report a decline in walkin customers and the dire effects on local spending and job stability. A separate attack early Sunday marked the first time someone has been injured in such an attack.

Continued on Page 14...

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Housing affordability improving across Canada, but Vancouver remains least affordable: report Continued from Page 1...

The report says housing affordability is improving because of lower interest rates, flat prices and sustained household income gains.

However, while further improvement in housing affordability is expected, the speed of improvement is likely to slow as the effect of earlier interest rate cuts fade, according to the report by the bank’s assistant chief economist, Robert Hogue.

The improving picture means that a Canadian household earning the median income of $85,400 needed to spend 53.6 per cent of that to cover the costs of owning a home in the last three months of 2025, down from a peak of 63.5 per cent at the end of 2023 but still high by historical standards.

That picture is improving in B.C. as well, but the proportion of household income eaten up by housing costs remains high.

It’s at 89.2 per cent for Vancouver, down from more than 100 per cent in 2024. In Victoria, the affordability measure rose slightly to 69 per cent, but is down from a high of 80 per cent in 2024.

That’s much higher than in places like Calgary (40.9 per cent), Edmonton (32.2 per cent), Montreal (48.4 per cent) and Ottawa (43.9 per cent). Toronto is at 66.4 per cent.

A decade ago, less than 40 per cent of median income was needed to cover housing. In the early 2000s, it was in the low 30 per cent range.

“For your average British Columbian, and especially for a household in Vancouver, it is still not an affordable housing market,” Hogue said.

Last week, a frank discussion over affordability, investors and related issues in housing showed where many stand after a group of B.C. developers and a group of housing experts released letters on the housing crisis.

RBC’s housing affordability index shows the proportion of median pre-tax income that would be needed to cover mortgage payments with a 20 per cent down payment, property taxes and utilities based.

Housing affordability is worse for single detached homes.

Industry experts sound the alarm as 2,500 units sit vacant in Vancouver Continued from Page 1...

Most alarmingly, other developers have started laying off staff or even going into receivership because of the market's stagnation.

Condo markets having an abundance of excess supply in Vancouver could mean a potential jumping-in point for first-time homebuyers.

According to the Greater Vancouver Realtors, the amount of properties sitting on the Multiple Listing Service (those for sale) is just under 15,000 — that’s over 36% below the 10-year seasonal average the

association noted (2).

However, BC isn’t the only place with a glut of supply. Recently, the Building Industry and Land Development Association is calling for government intervention in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) given plummeting sales in the region (3).

There were only 300 new homes sales in August of this year, Altus Group noted, which is 81% below the 10-year average and 42% below August 2024 levels. What do these patches of excess supply across Canada mean for buyers?

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OPINION

Pakistan’s illegal claim over Kashmir Islamabad anger and embarrassment is understandable.

Rawalpindi’s ill-considered decision to invest in the Afghan Taliban as a means to fulfill its ambition of creating “strategic depth” in Afghanistan by orchestrating placement of a pliable regime in Kabul as a buffer against India has backfired. And Afghan Acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi’s recent visit to New Delhi and his anti-Pakistan statements only added insult to Islamabad’s wounds.

While reacting to the joint statement issued during this visit, Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry mentioned that “It was conveyed that the reference to Jammu and Kashmir as part of India is in clear violation of the relevant UN Security Council resolutions and the legal status of Jammu and Kashmir.”

Though a oft repeated argument, Islamabad’s full of sound and fury statement merits a closer examination to ascertain the accuracy of the assertions contained therein.

Pakistan’s case on Kashmir is based on two argumentsone, J&K is “disputed territory”, and two, a plebiscite as envisaged in UNSC resolution 47 needs to be held in order to ascertain the wishes of the Kashmiri people and determine whether they want to remain with India or become part of Pakistan. While it may assert that its stance on Kashmir is principled and in keeping with UNSC resolutions, the reality is that Islamabad’s Kashmir narrative is a mix of half-truths and selective interpretation of UN resolutions.

Pakistan’s failure to garner support of the international community for its Kashmir narrative for more than sevenand-a half decades despite raising this issue on every conceivable occasion clearly indicates the inherent deficiency of compelling reasons in the same. So, let’s first examine Pakistan’s repetitive claim of J&K being “disputed territory” and thereafter the issue of plebiscite in J&K. A piece of real estate becomes disputed when its ownership is uncertain. The erstwhile ruler of J&K signed the Instrument of Accession in favour of India and being a legal document it made this kingdom an integral part of India. The fact that legality of J&K’s accession to India has never ever been questioned by the UNSC clearly proves that this region is very much an integral part of India. Yet, Pakistan wants the world to believe that J&K is deemed “disputed territory” by UNSC. As long as the ownership title of any disputed real estate remains unclear, the parties claiming rights over it don’t have any legal rights to make any arbitrary transactions related to such property.

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Surrey's surge in extortion-related violence 'a national crisis', says business leader Continued from Page 1...

A woman was sent to the hospital in critical condition after shots were fired at a Surrey home at about 3 a.m. in the 13000 block of 103A Avenue.

Huberman said the current level of response is not matching the seriousness of the issue, and called on Ottawa to intervene. “The Surrey Police Service can’t do it all. There needs to be real advocacy to ensure enhanced municipal policing and federal intelligence co-ordination to address this horrible wave of organized crime and extortion.” A local South Asian business leader, who spoke on condition of anonymity, called the situation “really scary,” and described how victims fear demands for money and threats of violence

if they speak out. On Thursday, Prime Minister Mark Carney says the federal government will introduce new legislation next week aimed at keeping violent, repeat offenders — including those behind extortion schemes — off the streets.

The bill will make bail more difficult to obtain for serious offences, including extortion, violent auto theft, break and enter, human trafficking and assault. It will also allow for consecutive sentencing, meaning an offender handed multiple sentences must serve them back-to-back.

Surrey–Newton Liberal MP Sukh Dhaliwal welcomed the announcement, saying that it sends a strong signal that Ottawa is responding to concerns from his community.

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In India, the more urgent challenge lies in food loss—the silent leakage that occurs during harvesting, storage, transportation, and distribution.

Estimates suggest that India wastes nearly 68 million tonnes of food annually, with 35–40% of fruits and vegetables lost post-harvest. For farmers, this translates into collapsing incomes even in years of good harvest; for consumers, it drives higher prices, volatile supplies, and compromised nutrition. This difference between “loss” and “waste” is crucial: policy interventions that focus solely on urban consumer behaviour will miss the heart of the problem.

Food loss is not only an economic tragedy, it is also an environmental one. Agriculture already consumes 80–90% of India’s freshwater, and when food is lost, the water, fertiliser, energy, and land that went into producing it are also wasted.

Rotting food further contributes to greenhouse gas emissions. Decomposing organic matter in landfills releases methane, a gas 28 times more potent than carbon dioxide. Globally, food waste is estimated to account for 6–8% of total emissions.

For India, where climate stress already affects harvests, this is a double burden: wasted food both deepens hunger and worsens climate change.

The challenge is further aggravated by climate variability. Erratic rains, unseasonal heatwaves, and sudden floods accelerate spoilage.

Crops that could once be stored for weeks now decay in days under higher temperatures.

Perishables such as apples, tomatoes, and milk face acute losses in the absence of reliable cold chains, turning climate stress into economic disaster. Farmers often confront a cruel choice: distress-sell at throwaway prices or let produce rot, both outcomes feeding the vicious cycle of rural poverty.

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“The deal may move quickly because Washington wants it, giving India relief from the 50% tariffs now hurting its exports,” Srivastava noted. Yet he urged caution: India should “hold firm on its red lines in agriculture, digital trade, e‑commerce, and intellectual property, and avoid any anti‑China clauses that could limit its strategic autonomy.”

Negotiators face familiar friction points.

In agriculture, limited market access through tariff cuts and tariff‑rate quotas on select US products is conceivable, but India remains protective of small farmers and dairy, wary of subsidized US competition.

On intellectual property, stricter patent standards risk undermining India’s generics industry and access to affordable medicines. In digital trade, the United

States typically seeks binding commitments on cross‑border data flows, data localization, and treatment of digital products; India prefers flexible, best‑endeavor language to preserve domestic policy space. E‑commerce rules and FDI in multi‑brand retail are additional sensitivities that touch competition, consumer protection, and the role of large platforms.

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