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Hindu Notes from General Studies-01

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India could save trillions in healthcare costs if Paris climate goals are met: Global Environmental Outlook

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News

  • India could save at least $3 trillion (₹210 trillion approx.) in healthcare costs if it implemented policy initiatives consistent with ensuring that the globe didn’t heat up beyond 1.5 degrees Celsius by the turn of the century, says the sixth edition of the Global Environmental Outlook (GEO), prepared by the United Nations Environment Programme.

Findings

  • Damage to the planet is so dire that people’s health will be increasingly threatened unless urgent action is taken.Unless environmental protections were drastically scaled up, cities and regions in Asia, the Middle East and Africa could see millions of premature deaths by mid-century.
  • India’s stated commitment is to lower emissions intensity of its GDP by 33-35% compared to 2005 levels by 2030; increase total cumulative electricity generation from fossil free energy sources to 40% by 2030, and create additional carbon sink of 2.5 to 3 billion tons through additional forest and tree cover.
  • India is on track to achieve two of these goals of emissions intensity and electricity generation according to independent climate-watch site Climate Tracker.
  • However these actions are only enough and provided other countries too live up to their commitments to limit temperature rise to 2 degrees.
  • For India to leapfrog onto a 1.5-degree pathway it would have to abandon plans to build new coal-fired power plants.
  • However there has been limited progress by countries since then in committing to greenhouse gas emissions cut since then.
  • Currently environmental ministers and delegates from around the world are participating in a UN conference in Nairobi to discuss issues such as stopping food waste, promoting the spread of electric mobility, and tackling the crisis of plastic pollution.
  • The report advises adopting less-meat intensive diets, and reducing food waste in both developed and developing countries, would reduce the need to increase food production by 50% to feed the projected 9-10 billion people on the planet in 2050.
  • At present, 33% of global edible food is wasted, and 56% of waste happens in industrialised countries.

Hindu Notes from General Studies-02

India, Pakistan hold talks on Kartarpur corridor

News

  • India and Pakistan held a meeting at Attari in Amritsar to discuss the modalities and draft agreement of pilgrims’ visit to Gurdwara Kartarpur Sahib using the Kartarpur corridor.

Beyond News

  • The Indian delegation was led by Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Pakistan team by Mohammad Faisal, DG (SA & SAARC) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
  • A joint statement issued after the first meeting said that both sides held detailed and constructive discussions on various aspects and provisions of the proposed agreement and agreed to work towards expeditiously making the corridor operational.
  • Both sides also held expert level discussions between technical experts on the alignment and other details of the proposed corridor.
  • Kartarpur Sahib is located in Pakistan’s Narowal district across the Ravi river, about four km from the Dera Baba Nanak shrine.
  • The corridor will facilitate visa-free travel of Indian pilgrims to the Gurdwara Darbara Sahib in Kartarpur. Pakistan has committed to open the corridor in November on the occasion of the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak.

Six U.S. nuclear power plants to be set up in India

News

  • New Delhi and Washington have agreed on a proposal to build six nuclear power plants in India.

Beyond News

  • This was stated in a joint statement issued at the conclusion of the 9th round of India-U.S. Strategic Security Dialogue in Washington, co-chaired by Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale and Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Andrea Thompson.
  • They committed to strengthen bilateral security and civil nuclear cooperation, including the establishment of six U.S. nuclear power plants in India.
  • India and the U.S. signed a historic agreement to cooperate in civil nuclear energy in October 2008. The deal gave a fillip to bilateral ties, which have been on an upswing since.
  • A major aspect of the deal was the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) that gave a special waiver to India enabling it to sign cooperation agreements with a dozen countries.
  • Post waiver, India signed civil nuclear cooperation agreements with the U.S., France, Russia, Canada, Argentina, Australia, Sri Lanka, the U.K., Japan, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Kazakhstan and South Korea.
  • S. reaffirmed its strong support to India’s early membership in the 48-member NSG. Notably, China has blocked India’s pending membership to the elite grouping that seeks to prevent proliferation of nuclear weapons.
  • During the meeting, the two sides exchanged views on a wide range of global security and non-proliferation challenges and reaffirmed their commitment to work together to prevent proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems and to deny access to such weapons by terrorists and non-state actors.
  • India’s Additional Secretary for Disarmament and International Security Affairs, and Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control, Verification and Compliance, co-chaired the third round of India-U.S. Space Dialogue.
  • The two delegations discussed trends in space threats, respective national space priorities and opportunities for cooperation bilaterally and in multilateral fora.

Hindu Notes from General Studies-03

Anti-tank missile developed by DRDO successfully fired

News

  • The Defence Research & Development Organisation (DRDO)-developed Man Portable Anti-Tank Guided Missile was successfully fired in the desert ranges of Rajasthan.

Beyond News

  • Defence Ministry sources informed that the missile launched from the shoulder is low weight, fire and forget, and was first fired successfully.
  • The indigenously developed missile has many advanced features like a state-of-the-art imaging infrared radar seeker with integrated avionics.
  • All the missile objectives have been met in both the missions with the missiles hitting designated targets precisely at different ranges.

New species of ‘Starry dwarf frog’ found in Western Ghats

News

  • A ‘secretive’ new species of orange-bellied frog with a brown back, covered in tiny spots that resemble a starry sky, has been discovered in the Western Ghats.

Beyond News

  • The thumbnail-sized species was named Astrobatrachus kurichiyanafor its constellation-like markings and the indigenous people of Kurichiyarmala, the hill range where it was found.
  • However, A kurichiyanais not only a new species to science. It is the sole member of an ancient lineage, a long branch on the frog tree of life that researchers have classified as a new subfamily, Astrobatrachinae.
  • Dark brown with a bright orange underbelly and speckled with pale blue dots, the frog camouflages well in wet leaf litter, and only a few individuals have been found.

Air pollution deaths are twice estimates

News

  • Air pollution causes 7,90,000 premature deaths every year in Europe and 8.8 million worldwide, doubling recent assessments, according to a study.

Findings

  • Between 40 and 80 percent of those excess deaths are caused by heart attacks, strokes and other types of cardiovascular disease underestimated up to now as a driver of smog-related mortality, researchers reported.
  • On average, a toxic cocktail of pollutants from vehicles, industry and agriculture shortens the lives of those who die prematurely by 2.2 years, they calculated.
  • Small and larger particulate matter, nitrogen dioxide (NO2), sulphur dioxide (SO2) and ozone (O3) have likewise been linked to drops in cognitive performance, labour productivity and educational outcomes.
  • The revised number for China is 2.8 million deaths per year,” more than two-and-a-half times current estimates.

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