Comprehensive Current affairs 14 December 2020

5thNational Family Health Survey.

The Health Ministry released partial data from the fifth edition of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) claiming “considerable improvement” in the supply of vaccine for childhood immunisation from the fourth round in 2015-16.

Key highlights:

Substantial improvement in maternal and child health indicators over NFHS-4 was recorded in the present survey.

The fertility rate has further declined, and contraceptive use has increased in most Phase I States.

The survey found considerable improvement in vaccination coverage among children aged 12-23 months across all States/UTs.

 The newest edition too has information on population, health and nutrition for India, and is based on statistics gleaned from 6.1 lakh households.

The survey found considerable improvement in vaccination coverage among children aged 12-23 months across all States/UTs. Women’s empowerment indicators (including women with bank account) also portray considerable progress.

Typically, NFHS data has an accompanying summary that explains changes in key health indicators from previous surveys. The latest edition lacks such a national comparison and instead only has tables listing out data from the 17 States and five UTs.

Prime Minister Street Vendors Atmanirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) Scheme .

Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs launched a programme of Socio-Economic Profiling of PM SVANidhibeneficiaries and their families.

Based on the profiled data, benefits of the various eligible Central Schemes would be extended to them for their holistic socio-economic upliftment.

PM SVANidhi was launched with an objective to provide affordable working capital loan up to Rs. 10,000 to Street Vendors for facilitating resumption of their livelihoods adversely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Urban Governance Index.

According to Urban Governance Index (UGI), Odisha has topped all Indian states in urban governance while Manipur and Nagaland are at the bottom.

It was recently released by the Praja Foundation.he Praja Foundation said the study for the Urban Governance Index 2020 conducted over three years (2017-2020) in 40 cities across 28 states as well as the NCT of Delhi.

It comprised 1,568 interviews, 20 state-level consultations, one regional consultation and a national-level consultation with key stakeholders such as elected city representatives.

 UGI ranks states to indicate where they stand in terms of real empowerment of grassroot democracy and local self-government.

Index showed that no state has devolved the 18 functions mentioned in the 12th Schedule (deals with Municipalities) of the Constitution to their city governments.

First rail link between Iran and Afghanistan.

The leaders of Iran and Afghanistan inaugurated the first railway link between the two countries. This expressing hope it would enhance trade links across the region.

The 140-kilometer (90-mile) line running from eastern Iran into western Afghanistan will eventually be expanded by 85 kilometers to reach the Afghan city of Herat, providing a crucial transport link for the landlocked country, where decades of war have hindered infrastructure development.

The $75 million project began in 2007, with Iran funding construction on both sides of the border as part of its development assistance to Afghanistan.

Iran hopes to transform itself into a regional transport hub, allowing Afghanistan and other landlocked Asian countries to transport goods to its ports on the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman.

Iran already has rail links with Turkmenistan, Pakistan and Turkey.

World carbon dioxide emissions drop 7 per cent during pandemic .

New preliminary figures show that, a locked-down pandemic-struck world cut its carbon dioxide emissions this year by 7%.

The Global Carbon Project, an authoritative group of dozens of international scientists who track emissions, calculated that the world will have put 37 billion U.S. tons (34 billion metric tons) of carbon dioxide in the air in 2020.

The study published in the journal Earth System Science Data.

Scientists say this drop is chiefly because people are staying home, traveling less by car and plane, and that emissions are expected to jump back up after the pandemic ends. Ground transportation makes up about one-fifth of emissions of carbon dioxide, the chief man-made heat-trapping gas.

The same group of scientists months ago predicted emission drops of 4% to 7%, depending on the progression of COVID-19. A second coronavirus wave and continued travel reductions pushed the decrease to 7%.

Emissions dropped 12% in the United States and 11% in Europe, but only 1.7% in China.

The calculations based on reports detailing energy use, industrial production and daily mobility counts were praised as accurate by outside scientists.

Asia Pacific Vaccine Access Facility.

It is a $9 billion initiative, launched by Asian Development Bank (ADB), that will help its developing member economies to procure and deliver Coronavirus vaccines.

Parts covered by its facility include cold-chain storage and transport, vehicles, distribution infrastructure, and also processing facilities.

APVAX will have two components:

Rapid Response Component to support critical vaccine diagnostics, procurement of vaccines, and transporting vaccines.

Project Investment Component for investments in systems for successful distribution, delivery, and administration of vaccines along with associated investments in building capacity.

Centre left with mere 10% NREGA funds as scheme sees 243% jump in Corona times .

In Covid pandemic time, the Central government has made a record payment to MG-NREGA workers, the world’s biggest job guarantee scheme, in the financial year 2020-21.

 It resulting in the rural development ministry being left with 10% of the total funds to be spent on the scheme in the remaining four months of the current fiscal year, shows government data.

The rural development ministry, MG-NREGA scheme, was provided with Rs 84,900 crore for the current financial year by the finance ministry in two instalments. Of this amount, the ministry data shows, Rs 76, 800 crore has already been spent. In comparison, till November 2019, the ministry had spent about Rs 50,000 crore on the scheme.

According to MG-NREGA tracker said the huge expenditure on the scheme was on account of 10 million more households getting work under the MG-NREGA this year (till November), 243% increase in person days (work) generated and higher wage paid to workers as compared to previous years. The total active job cards this year was 90.2 million and of them, 83.09% sought work,” the tracker prepared by People Action for Employment Guarantee (PAEG).

The higher demand for MG-NREGA work was because of close to 20 million workers returning to their villages from cities after the Central government announced nation-wide lockdown on March 24. Although the demand peaked in the month of May, it slowed down in subsequent months as workers from poorer states such as Odisha, Bihar and Jharkhand started returning to cities for work.

The report said the average work provided to individual households was less than the previous years.

The report also said that around 13% of the 75 million households, who demand work, got no work. “The data shows that there was a surge for NREGA work demand due to the pandemic and the government failed to meet the demand,” the report said.

Quantum key distribution technology.

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) successfully demonstrated communication between its two labs using Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) technology, which is a “robust” way to share encryption keys, said an official statement.

 In the QKD technology, encryption keys are sent as qubits in a fibre optic cable. Quantum computing uses qubits as basic resources, similar to how bits are used as basic resources in classical computing.

The QKD is designed in a way that if an illegitimate entity tries to read the transmission, it will disturb the qubits - which are encoded on photons - and this will generate transmission errors, leading to legitimate end users being immediately informed.

The Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL) and The Research Centre Imarat (RCI) were the two labs that participated in this demonstration.

“Quantum Communication using the time-bin QKD scheme was performed under realistic conditions. The setup also demonstrated the validation of detection of a third party trying to gain knowledge of the communication.

Time-bin encoding is used to encode qubit on a photon.

3D printing policy.

The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) willintroduce 3D printing policy.

It aimed at promoting 3D printing on an industrial scale and helping domestic companies.

The policy will help develop a “conducive ecosystem for design, development and deployment” of 3D printing and additive manufacturing.

3D printing and a viable industry around it is mostly in the shape of additive manufacturing, wherein companies make specific products for projects where there are very specific demands such as lightweight equipment, etc.

A draft policy paper on the subject will soon be sent out to experts in the domain to seek their opinion on the way ahead.

 The global market for additive manufacturing is expected to reach $ 34.8 billion by 2024, which is growing at a compound annual growth rate of 23.2 per cent, according to the IT Ministry’s estimates.

3D printing or additive manufacturing uses computer-aided designing to make prototypes or working models of objects by laying down successive layers of materials such as plastic, resin, thermoplastic, metal, fiber or ceramic.

With the help of software, the model to be printed is first developed by the computer, which then gives instructions to the 3D printer.

According to the draft policy, the Central Government will also look to encourage market leaders to establish global bases for 3D manufacturing in India, while also discouraging imports of printed material for domestic requirements.

Haryana redesignates body for micro-irrigation projects .

The Haryana government has decided to restructure and redesignate the Command Area Development Authority (CADA) as Micro Irrigation and Command Area Development Authority (MICADA) for the effective implementation of micro-irrigation projects, especially in the water-deficient areas, along with watercourses work on various canal commands in the state.

The aim of the present state government has been to ensure optimum and effective utilisation of available water resources in the state. While implementing the micro-irrigation projects, priority should be given to the areas having scarcity of water.

The government also encourage to farmers to know about the benefits of micro-irrigation so as to encourage them to adopt micro-irrigation techniques in agriculture to conserve waters.

Climate ambition Summit 2020.

The United Nations (UN), United Kingdom (UK) and France are proud to be co-hosting the Climate Ambition Summit 2020, in partnership with Chile and Italy on 12 December held virtually.

 It exactly five years since the adoption of the Paris Agreement.

UN chief has urged world leaders to declare a “state of climate emergency” and shape greener growth after the coronavirus pandemic, as he opened a summit marking five years since the landmark Paris Agreement.

The commitments made in Paris in 2015 were “far from enough” to limit temperature rises to 1.5 degrees Celsius, the UN secretary-general said in his opening address to the summit, which is co-hosted by Britain and France.

The Summit is a major step on the road to the next UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26), which will be hosted by the UK next November in Glasgow.

The Summit will provide leaders with a global platform to showcase commitments to tackle climate change which will be under the three pillars of the Paris Agreement: mitigation, adaptation and finance commitments. There will be no space for general statements.