May 22nd, 2020 PIB:- Download PDF Here

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Cyclone Amphan
2. PM-KISAN
3. Government is promoting Beekeeping as part of its aim to double farmers’ income
4. Central Warehouse Corporation
5. UMANG Application
6. International Day for Biological Diversity 2020
7. Dr. Harsh Vardhan elected as Chair of Executive Board of WHO
8. Garbage Free City Star Rating
9. NTPC in pact with ONGC to set up Joint Venture Company for Renewable Energy Business
10. IASST develops electrochemical sensing platform for detecting carcinogenic & mutagenic compounds in food

1. Cyclone Amphan

What’s in News?

Prime Minister conducted an aerial survey of areas of Odisha and West Bengal affected by Cyclone Amphan.

• Rs 500 crore financial assistance was announced for Odisha.
• 1,000 crore for was announced for immediate relief activities in the State of West Bengal.

Cyclone Amphan has been covered in 22n^d May 2020 Comprehensive News Analysis. Click here to read.

2. PM-KISAN

What’s in News?

The Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare is taking several measures to facilitate the farmers and farming activities at field level during the lockdown period in the wake of COVID 19 pandemic.

• Under the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) Scheme during the lockdown period from 24.3.2020 till date, about 55 crore farmer families have been benefitted.

Read more about PM-KISAN.

3. Government is promoting Beekeeping as part of its aim to double farmers’ income

What’s in News?

A webinar was conducted by the National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC) on the theme “Sweet Revolution and Atma Nirbhar Bharat”.

• The objective was to popularize scientific beekeeping as source of livelihood for landless rural poor, small and marginal famers to supplement agricultural income, as also as tool to enhance agriculture and horticulture production.
• Issues before beekeepers such as promotion of scientific beekeeping, quality assurance, minimum support price, transport of bee colonies, processing, packaging, branding, testing, organic certification of honey and different beehive products were discussed.
• Successful beekeepers and entrepreneurs from Kashmir, West Bengal, Uttarakhand, Bihar, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh shared their experiences and suggested ways forward to bring about the Sweet Revolution.

Details:

• The Union Minister of Agriculture & Farmers’ Welfare has said the Government is promoting Beekeeping as part of its aim to double farmers’ income.
• The Government has allocated 500 crore towards Beekeeping under the Atma Nirbhar Abhiyan.
• National Bee Board has created four modules to impart training as part of the National Beekeeping and Honey Mission (NBHM) and 30 lakh farmers have been trained in beekeeping. They are also being financially supported by the Government.
• The Government has launched ‘Honey Mission’ as part of ‘Sweet Revolution’.
• India is among the world’s top five honey producers.
• Compared to 2005-06 honey production has risen by 242% and exports shot by 265%.

4. Central Warehouse Corporation

What’s in News?

The Central Warehouse Corporation (CWC) achieved the highest ever turnover of about Rs.1710 Crore during 2019-20.

• CWC is a Schedule ‘A’-Mini Ratna, Category – 1 Central Public Sector Enterprise (CPSE).
• It is a statutory body which was established under ‘The Warehousing Corporations Act, 1962’.
• It is a public Warehouse operator offering logistics services to diverse group of clients.
• Its aim is to provide reliable, cost-effective, value-added, integrated warehousing and logistics solution in a socially responsible and environmentally friendly manner.

5. UMANG Application

What’s in News?

The following 7 services hosted on the web site of India Meteorological Department (IMD) have been on boarded to the Unified Mobile Application for New-age Governance (UMANG) application.

Details:

• IMD has taken various initiatives in recent years for improvement in the dissemination of weather forecast and warning services based on latest tools and technologies.
• To further enhance this initiative, IMD has taken the leverage of Digital India Programme to utilise “UMANG App”.

The following 7 services hosted on web site of IMD have been on boarded to UMANG Application:

• Current Weather – Current temperature, humidity, wind speed, direction for 150 cities are updated 8 times a day.
• Nowcast – Three hourly warnings of localized weather phenomena and their intensity is issued for about 800 stations, and districts of India by State Meteorological Centres of IMD.
• City Forecast – Past 24 hours and 7-day forecast of weather conditions around 450 cities in India are given.
• Rainfall Information– All India district Rainfall information daily, weekly, monthly and cumulative series are available.
• Tourism Forecast – Past 24 hours and 7-day forecast of weather conditions of around 100 Tourist cities in India are provided.
• Warnings – Alerts are issued to warn citizens of approaching dangerous weather. It is colour coded in Red, Orange and yellow.
• Cyclone – Cyclone warnings and alerts provide the track of cyclonic storms along with likely time and point of crossing of the coast.

UMANG:

• UMANG is an all-in-one single, unified, secure, multi-channel, multi-platform, multi-lingual, multi-service mobile app, powered by a robust back-end platform providing access to high impact services of the various organization (Central and State).
• The UMANG App was launched in 2017 to bring all government services on a single mobile app, with a larger goal to make the government accessible on mobile phones.

6. International Day for Biological Diversity 2020

What’s in News?

In a virtual celebration of the International Day for Biological Diversity 2020, Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change launched key initiatives towards conservation of biodiversity.

• The year 2020 which is also the “SUPER YEAR FOR BIODIVERSITY”, as the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity with 20 global Aichi targets adopted in 2010 ends in 2020 and all the countries together are in the process of preparation of Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework.

Details:

• The National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Biodiversity Samrakshan Internship Programme was launched.
• United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Campaign on Illegal Trafficking of Endangered Species: ‘Not all Animals Migrate by Choice’ was launched.
  • The campaign ‘Not all Animals Migrate by Choice’, launched by the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau, with UNEP, seeks to address these environmental challenges, to raise awareness, and to advocate solutions.
• A Webinar Series on ‘Biodiversity Conservation and Biological Diversity Act, 2002’ was also launched along with the WWF Model Conference of Parties (MCoP), an initiative which involves the younger generation so they can usher in a new beginning and engage in conversations around the impact of humanity’s footprint on biodiversity and also the importance of sustenance of biodiversity for our own survival.
• An awareness campaign supported by WWF to highlight the crucial role played by nature through its free ecological services provided for humankind was also launched.

International Day for Biological Diversity:

• The United Nations has proclaimed May 22^nd as the International Day for Biological Diversity (IDB) to increase understanding and awareness of biodiversity issues.
• The theme for International Day for Biological Diversity 2020 is “Our solutions are in nature”.

Aichi Target:

The Aichi Targets were adopted at the Nagoya Conference of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). In the conference of parties (COP-10), the parties agreed to come up with new plans and targets as the previous targets on biodiversity protection were not achieved. The short-term plan which consists of 5 strategic goals and further subdivided into 20 ambitious targets is collectively known as Aichi targets.

• Strategic Goal A: Address the underlying causes of biodiversity loss by mainstreaming biodiversity across government and society.
• Strategic Goal B: Reduce the direct pressures on biodiversity and promote sustainable use.
• Strategic Goal C: Improve the status of biodiversity by safeguarding ecosystems, species and genetic diversity.
• Strategic Goal D: Enhance the benefits to all from biodiversity and ecosystem services.
• Strategic Goal E: Enhance implementation through participatory planning, knowledge management and capacity building.

7. Dr Harsh Vardhan elected as Chair of Executive Board of WHO

What’s in News?

The Union Minister of Health & Family Welfare Dr. Harsh Vardhan has been elected as Chair of the Executive Board of World Health Organization for the year 2020-21. This took place during the 147th session of the Executive Board, in a meeting that was virtually held.

• Harsh Vardhan has also been a member of several prestigious committees of WHO like Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) and the Global Technical Consultative Group (TCG) on Polio Eradication.
• He has also served as an Advisor to the WHO.

Executive Board of WHO:

• The Executive Board of WHO is composed of 34 technically qualified members elected for a three-year term.
• The main functions of the Board are to implement the decisions and policies of the Health Assembly and advise and facilitate its work.

8. Garbage Free City Star Rating

What’s in News?

Navi Mumbai has been rated 5-star in the new list of garbage-free cities under the Star Rating Protocol of Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs for the assessment year 2019-2020.

• A crucial factor which has helped the city clinch the award is the use of technology for garbage collection, enabling 100 per cent garbage pick-up.
• Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) has a robust system of tracking each and every trash bin in the city. There are microchips affixed to every bin; the civic body uses GPS mechanism to track garbage collection.
• NMMC uses waste trucks to take rounds every eight hours.
• All these trucks are equipped with Radio-frequency identification (RFID) chips, GPS and GPRS and their movement, route and location are tracked through an app.

Garbage Free City Star Rating:

• The Star Rating Protocol has been devised in a holistic manner including components such as the cleanliness of drains and water bodies, plastic waste management, managing construction & demolition waste, etc. which are critical drivers for achieving garbage-free cities.
• While the key thrust of this protocol is on Solid Waste Management, it also takes care of ensuring certain minimum standards of sanitation through a set of prerequisites defined in the framework.

9. NTPC in pact with ONGC to set up Joint Venture Company for Renewable Energy Business

What’s in News?

National Thermal Power Corporation Limited (NTPC Ltd.), the PSU under Ministry of Power and Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Limited (ONGC), the PSU under Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to set up a Joint Venture Company for Renewable Energy business.

• The MoU will enable both companies to accelerate their footprint in Renewable Energy.
• As per the MoU, NTPC and ONGC will explore the setting up of offshore wind and other Renewable Energy Projects in India and overseas.
• They shall also explore opportunities in the fields of sustainability, storage, E-mobility and ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) compliant projects.

Details:

• NTPC presently has 920 MW of installed Renewable power projects in its portfolio and about 2300 MW of RE projects under construction.
• With this tie-up, NTPC would accelerate its RE capacity addition program and also expand its footprint in offshore wind and overseas Renewable Energy projects.
• This will help India’s largest power generator achieve its ambitious target of 32 GW of Renewable Energy Projects by 2032.
• ONGC has a renewable portfolio of 176 MW comprising of 153 MW wind power and 23 MW of solar.
• This development will enhance the presence of ONGC in the Renewable Power business and enable its ambition to add 10 GW of renewable power to its portfolio by 2040.

10. IASST develops electrochemical sensing platform for detecting carcinogenic & mutagenic compounds in food

What’s in News?

Institute of Advanced Study in Science and Technology (IASST), Guwahati, has developed an electrochemical sensing platform for detecting carcinogenic or mutagenic compound N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) and N-nitrosodiethanolamine (NDEA).

• It was achieved by developing a modified electrode by immobilizing carbon nanomaterials (carbon dots) in DNA.
• The electrochemical biosensor platform was developed using the ability of NDMA and NDEA, to alter the DNA.
  • The scientists took advantage of the fact that out of the base pairs A, T, G, C, Guanine (G) is electrochemically active.
• The DNA adducts formed are electrochemically active, which ultimately leads to an increase in peak current in electrochemical set-up, helping in the detection of the chemicals.
• Carbon dots (CDs), a carbon-based nanomaterial, was used, which is already established as a biocompatible and environmentally friendly material.
• Naturally derived chitosan, (natural biopolymer obtained from the shells of shrimp, lobster, and crabs) is an environment-friendly sustainable material that was used to synthesize CDs.

Significance:

• The scientists pointed out that with changing food habits of urban Indians, they are exposed to harmful chemicals belonging to Nitrosamine family in cured meats, bacon, some cheese, low-fat dry milk, and fish. Such chemicals include carcinogenic ones like NDMA and NDEA, which may also alter the chemical composition of our DNA.
• Hence it is important to develop detection techniques to detect them.

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