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Daily G.K. - Top Stories

18 Jan 2019

INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

Hitachi Freezes UK Nuclear Project

  •  Japan's Hitachi decided to freeze a 3 trillion yen ($28 billion) nuclear power project in Wales as Britain scrabbles for a way to exit the European Union, dealing a blow to UK plans for the replacement of ageing plants.
  • The suspension comes as Hitachi's Horizon Nuclear Power failed to find private investors for its plans to build a plant in Anglesey, which was expected to provide about 6% of Britain's electricity.
  • Hitachi had called on the British government to boost financial support for the project to appease investor anxiety, but turmoil over the country's impending EU exit limited the government's capacity to compile plans.
  • Hitachi had banked on a group of Japanese investors and the British government each taking a one-third stake in the equity portion of the project.
  • The project would have been financed one-third by equity and rest by debt.
View Month Wise

ENVIRONMENT

Rising Temperature to Make Coffee Costly

  •  Rising temperatures are reducing the range of wild arabica plants, the most popular bean for drinkers. From Brazil to Ethiopia and Kenya, growers are moving uphill and deploying new technologies to maintain yields.
  • Within the next seven decades, the places arabica can grow naturally is likely to fall by at least 50%, scientists at Britain's Royal Botanical Gardens said in a report.
  • Today's abundance of beans, which has kept a lid on prices in the world's coffee shops, could reverse as the shift in the climate reduces the potential size of the crop in the years ahead.
  • Arabica beans are the most common source of coffee worldwide, thriving in cool regions with distinct rainy and dry seasons.
  • They need year round temperatures of 150 to 240 Celsius, according to the Coffee Research Institute.
  • Too cold and they suffer from frost. Too warm and the quality of the coffee declines. The taste of the beans depends on crisp nights.
  • Yet farmers are noticing the plant's range is shifting because of rising temperatures. It has been too warm from September through November when arabica plants flower.
  • The result: flowers fall off more frequently, cutting the yield per tree.
  • The biggest risk is to the wild version of arabica plants, which contain the genetic storehouse needed to produce new flavours and more robust plants.
  • Scientists said the natural range of those plants is narrowing for three reasons — climate change, fungus and deforestation.
  • Their concern is that more than half of all wild coffee species may be extinct by 2088.
  • Wild arabica, which when grown commercially is the most widely traded coffee in the world, has been placed on an endangered list.
View Month Wise

BUSINESS AND ECONOMY

Swiggy Most Trusted Food Tech Brand

  •  Online food delivery startup Swiggy, run by Bundl Technologies Pvt. Ltd, emerged on top in trust and customer satisfaction in a food-tech survey by research firm RedSeer Management Consulting Pvt. Ltd.
  • According to the latest edition of the RedSeer FoodTech Leadership Index (FLI), Swiggy ranked no. 1 with a total score of 96, outscoring arch-rival Zomato, which came in second with a score of 82 in the fourth quarter of 2018.
  • Uber Eats and Foodpanda came in third and fourth at 73 and 70, respectively.
  • In December, Swiggy raised $1 billion in the biggest-ever funding round in the country's booming food-tech space, increasing pressure on Zomato to also raise fresh funds.
  • In the business of food delivery, top firms such as Swiggy and Zomato need to keep raising capital to win share in a cut-throat, hyper-competitive market.

BASF and Adani Group to Setup Petrochem Hub

  •  BASF SE, the world's largest chemical producer, will set up a petrochemical production hub at a cost of Rs. 16,000 crore in Gujarat in a joint venture (JV) with the Ahmedabad-based Adani Group. The two companies signed a MoU.
  • The German company will hold the majority in the joint venture, which will invest in the "acrylics value chain". The designated site would be at Mundra port in Gujarat and a feasibility study will be completed by the end of 2019.
  • The investment will go into the development, construction and operation of production plants including propane dehydrogenation (PDH), oxo C4 complex (butanols and 2-ethylhexanol), glacial acrylic acid (GAA), butyl acrylate (BA) and potentially other downstream products.
  • The products are predominantly for the Indian market to serve a wide range of local industries, including construction, automotive and coatings, whose growing demand is currently supplied via imports.
  •  In addition to the investment outlined in this MoU, BASF plans to co-invest as a minority partner in a wind and solar park.
  • The announcement comes on the eve of the Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit 2019 where top leaders from Adani group and BASF are going to attend.

Relief For NGOs That Get Foreign Funding

  •  NGOs and associations registered under the Foreign Contributions (Regulation) Act, 2010, will no longer be required to mandatorily register with DARPAN portal to avail FCRA-related services like registration, prior permission, renewal and uploading of returns.
  • The relief comes after NGOs complained of difficulty in getting unique ID under the DARPAN portal, a NITI Aayog-operated platform, due to various reasons. 
View Month Wise

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

India To First Send a Humanoid Into Space

  •  India will not use animals to test systems for the Gaganyaan project. The Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) will have a humanoid — robot resembling a human — conducting experiments in space twice before actually sending humans by 2022.
  • As per ISRO Chairman, K Sivan, the humanoid is almost ready. The mission should serve a purpose beyond displaying our ability to send humans and bring them back safely.
  • The robot will be able to do whatever a man can do, although not as extensively as them. Even the first flight will not go empty and utilise the opportunity to the maximum.

India To Train 45 Nations In Nano-Satellite Making

  • India will train 45 countries in nano-satellite making through a new capacity building programme.
  • The programme named Unispace Nanosatellite Assembly and Training(UNNATI) by Isro was flagged off by Isro chairman K.Sivan and junior minister of space Jitendra Singh at UR Rao Satellite Centre in Bengaluru.
  • The first batch course started this month and will be completed by March 2019.

AI helps find new human ancestor

  •  An artificial intelligence system has identified a previously unknown human ancestor that roamed the planet tens of thousands of years ago and left a genomic footprint in Asian individuals.
  • By combining deep learning algorithms and statistical methods, researchers from the University of Tartu in Estonia, Institute of Evolutionary Biology (IBE), and the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) in Spain and found that the extinct species was a hybrid of Neanderthals and Denisovans and cross bred with modern humans in Asia.
  • The finding, published in 'Nature Communications', would explain that the hybrid found last year in the caves of Denisova — the offspring of a Neanderthal mother and a Denisovan father — was not an isolated case, but rather was part of a more general introgression process.
  • Researchers used deep learning for the first time ever to account for human evolution, paving the way for the application of this technology in other questions in biology, genomics and evolution.
View Month Wise

SPORTS

Ranji Trophy: Kerala in Semis

  •  Kerala made a slice of Ranji history by reaching the semi-finals for the first time on Thursday, stunning former winners Gujarat after skittling them out for 81 in the second innings. 
  • Once a cricketing lightweight, their Vision 2020 put in place seems to be paying dividends. Kerala hired Dav Whatmore as coach before the last season, reaching the quarterfinals.
  • Kerala have risen rapidly in the last few seasons. Their impressive run this season includes an away win over Bengal.
  • The bowling heroics in the Gujarat second innings came from seamers Basil Thampi (5) and Sandeep Warrier (4). Thampi was Man-of-the-Match for his 8/88.
  • Set 195 to win, Gujarat were 11/3 after skipper Parthiv Patel was run out to a direct hit by rival skipper Sachin Baby. The last six wickets fell for 24.

Ronaldo Seals Italian Super Cup For Juve

  •  Cristiano Ronaldo scored the only goal to hand Juventus their first trophy of the season with a 1-0 win over tenman AC Milan in the Italian Super Cup in Saudi Arabia.
  • Ronaldo headed in a 61st-minute winner, while Milan played the last quarter of an hour a man down after midfielder Franck Kessie saw red for a bad tackle on Emre Can.

First Indian in Laureus List

  •  Ace Indian wrestler Vinesh Phogat has become the first Indian to receive a nomination in the prestigious Laureus World Sports Awards to be held on February 18.
  • The 24-year-old Indian, who made a sensational comeback after battling a long injury lay-off to win a gold medal at the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games and Jakarta Asian Games, has been nominated for the Laureus World Comeback of the Year.
  • The Haryana wrestler has been nominated alongside US Tour Championship winner Tiger Woods, who won his first event in five years.
  • The last time an Indian sporting feat made its way to the Laureus World Sports Awards was in 2004 when the Indian cricket team and Pakistan cricket team shared the Laureus Sport for Good Award for playing an international match despite political tensions.
  • However, Vinesh makes history as the first Indian athlete to be nominated in one of the seven main categories.
View Month Wise

NATIONAL AFFAIRS

Congress's Income Lowest in 11 Years

  •  The Congress party has declared Rs.199 crore of income for 2017-18, a 12% decline from the previous year and its lowest in 11 years, according to the annual audit report filed by the party with the Election Commission of India (ECI) and data compiled by election watchdog Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR).
  • The ECI made the audit report public. ADR data is available on its website. The Congress party's income for the year is a fifth of the Rs.1,027 crore declared by its key opponent, the ruling BJP.
  • The Congress party earned more income than the BJP every year between 2001-02 and 2012-13.
  • The Congress party's income for the year is a fifth of the Rs. 1,027 crore declared by its key opponent, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

SC Strikes Down Ban on Dance Bars in Maharashtra

  •  Five years after it first upheld a 2006 Bombay high court order striking down the ban on dance bars in Maharashtra, the Supreme Court set aside most of the stringent conditions imposed by the state that hampered grant of licences and led to the closure of most bars.
  • The Maharashtra government has since 2005 made three attempts to ban dance bars, and this is the third time the SC has intervened to
  • protect the interest of bar owners and bar girls. This time, the court quashed provisions to bring the bars under CCTV surveillance and to ban serving of liquor, noting the regulations were totally disproportionate, unreasonable and arbitrary. It also said separation of dancing area from the bar area by placing a non-transparent partition was not required.
  • The court, however, agreed with the state in allowing dance bars to operate only between 6pm-11.30pm and to ban the practice of showering notes and coins on the dancing stage.
  • The SC said there cannot be complete prohibition from serving alcoholic beverages, and other measures have to be adopted to check any nuisance. 

India's First Cinema Museum

  •  PM Narendra Modi  will inaugurate the country's first National Museum of Indian Cinema (NMIC) on January 19.
  • This state-of the-art museum, built at a cost of over Rs 140 crore, aims to take its visitors through an absorbing journey of over a century of Indian cinema with the help of visuals, graphics, artifacts, interactive exhibits and multimedia expositions.
  • The museum is housed in two buildings — the five-storey New Museum Building and the 19th century Victorian Gothic bungalow Gulshan Mahal — on the Films Division campus in Mumbai.
  • After decades of being used as the home of a Khoja merchant, a hospital for World War II soldiers, the Jai Hind College campus and the Films Division office, Gulshan Mahal will now house quaint artifacts of India's pre-cinema history, like 'chitrapat' — an unravelling scroll of pictures — and Magic Lantern, which shows a successive projection of glass slide images creating the illusion of movement.
  • It will also showcase over a hundred years of Indian cinema through nine sections, ranging from the origins of Indian cinema to silent films to the studio era to the New Wave.
View Month Wise

DEFENCE

MHA To Have Own Satelllite

  •  The Union home ministry (MHA), responsible for guarding borders along Bangladesh, Myanmar and parts of Pakistan will have a satellite of its own for better domain awareness and border guarding.
  • The satellite will be made and launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
  • This project will strengthen island and border security and facilitate the development of infrastructure in border/ island areas. 
  • Putting up a satellite and using space technology to improve border management was part of recommendations by a task-force.
  • The recommendations have been accepted by home minister Rajnath Singh.
  • Some of the key recommendations included building capacity in border guarding forces, using space resources for security, operation, planning and border infrastructure development.
  • The satellite is being launched by the ISRO for the exclusive use of the MHA.

US's New Missile Defence Plan

  •   The Trump administration will roll out a new strategy for a more aggressive space-based missile defence system to protect against existing threats from North Korea and Iran and counter advanced weapon systems being developed by Russia and China.
  • Details about the administration's Missile Defence Review — the first compiled since 2010 — are expected to be released during President Donald Trump's visit to the Pentagon with top members of his administration.
  • The new review concludes that in order to adequately protect America, the Pentagon must expand defence technologies in space and use those systems to more quickly detect, track and ultimately defeat incoming missiles.
  • Recognising the potential concerns surrounding any perceived weaponisation of space, the strategy pushes for studies. No testing is mandated, and no final decisions have been made.
  • Specifically, the US is looking at putting a layer of sensors in space to more quickly detect enemy missiles when they are launched. The US sees space as a critical area for advanced, next-generation capabilities to stay ahead of the threats.

Taiwan Holds Live-fire Drills

  •  Taiwan held live fire exercises along its east coast amid renewed threats from China to bring the island under its control by force if deemed necessary.
  • Artillery and assault helicopters fired at targets off the west coast city of Taichung, while French-made Mirage fighter jets took off amid rainy conditions from the air base at Hsinchu to the north.
  • The drills are Taiwan's first since Chinese President Xi Jinping on January 2 reasserted Beijing's willingness to use military force to bring self-ruling Taiwan under Chinese control.
  • The drills also follow a new Pentagon report laying out US concerns about China's growing military might, underscoring worries about a possible attack against Taiwan.
  • Taiwan's independence-leaning President Tsai Ing-wen has made national defence a priority while refusing China's demand that she recognise Taiwan as a part of China. That's led to Beijing ratcheting up economic, military and diplomatic pressure on the island of 23 million.
View Month Wise

PERSONS IN NEWS

First South Asian to Join Intelligence Committee of the US House of Representatives

  •   Democratic lawmaker Raja Krishnamoorthi became the first South Asian to join the powerful intelligence committee of the US House of Representatives, which has oversight over the 17 intelligence agencies and will play an aggressive role in investigating President Donald Trump.
  • Krishnamoorthi, a two term member of the House from Illinois, is among four freshmen named to the panel, which is headed by Adam Schiff, an outspoken critic of the president.
  • Also, the White House forwarded to US Senate names of three Indian-Americans for confirming their nomination to senior positions in the Trump administration: Rita Baranwal as assistant secretary at the department of energy, Bimal Patel as assistant secretary at the department of treasury and Aditya Bamzai as a member on the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board.
  • Their appointments were announced by the White House in 2018, and the communication to the Senate, sent along with many other nominations, will end the wait for them, running into several months. Bamzai's nomination was announced in August, Patel's in September, and Baranwal 's in October.
  • The House committee on intelligence was front and centre in the previous Congress, under Republican chairman Devin Nunes, as Trump's chief defender.

Vivek Joshi appointed new Registrar General

  •  The Centre has appointed Vivek Joshi, a 1989-batch IAS officer from Haryana cadre, as the new Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India.
  • He replaces incumbent Sailesh, who was named as RGI and Census Commissioner in January 2018 and had been holding additional charge of the post even after he was appointed as secretary, department of official language under the home ministry, in May 2018.

John Bogle dies at 89

  •  John Bogle, who popularized the low-cost index-based mutual fund as founder of Vanguard Group and insisted that most stockpicking money managers weren't worth the fees they charged, has died. He was 89.
  • Bogle proselytized on behalf of patient, long-term investing in a diversified group of well-run companies.
  • He focused his advocacy on index funds, those that buy and hold the broadest mixes of stocks. He cautioned that the pursuit of quick trades and short-term profits typically helped investment advisers more than investors. 
  • Bogle's formula turned Vanguard into the largest US manager of stock and bond funds.
View Month Wise

DAYS AND EVENTS

Sunburn Music Festival To Return To Goa In Feb

  •  After three years, electronic dance music festival Sunburn will be returning to Goa but in a different avatar. Percept Live, the wholly owned subsidiary of Percept Ltd, has announced a collaboration with Goa-based Klassique to co-promote all Sunburn events in the state.
  • Under this alliance, the first two-day event — Sunburn Klassique — will be held at Vagator beach from February 23.
  • Represented by Shailesh Shetty, Klassique will be responsible for all local logistics and permissions for Sunburn Klassique. 
View Month Wise

GOVERNMENT POLICIES AND SCHEMES

 Draft Emigration Bill Open for Public Feedback

  •  In a bid to address the myriad problems of migrants as well as to draft policies to regulate the movement of Indians overseas for work or education, the government has finalised the draft Emigration Bill, which is now open for public feedback.
  • The bill comes weeks after the Parliament standing committee made a special appeal to the ministry of external affairs to complete drafting of the proposed legislation.
  • The central feature of the new act would be establishment of an Emigration Management Authority to oversee the welfare of emigrants. 
  • It will be the overarching authority to provide policy guidance, undertaking comprehensive review and stocktaking on emigration management related matters.
  • It aims to be a multi-ministry agency, with representatives from the ministries of home and human resources besides states.
  • An emigration bureau will be led by a joint secretary to handle operational matters.
View Month Wise

GENDER/ HEALTH/ EDUCATION

IIT Hyderabad to Launch B-Tech in AI

  •  A full-fledged B- Tech programme in Artificial Intelligence would be introduced by the IIT- Hyderabad, from the coming academic year.
  • Admission to the course with an intake of around 20 students would be through JEE- Advanced.
  • IIT-Hyderabad has become the first Indian educational institute to offer such a course in AI. The institute is already offering an M-Tech course in AI. 

8 Institutes Kept Out of EWS Reservation

  •  The Centre notified the reservation for the economically weaker sections (EWS) and exempted eight "institutions of excellence" the 10% quota in keeping with the policy to isolate these highly specialised centres from changes in reservation laws.
  • The institutes are Homi Bhabha National Institute, Mumbai, Tata Institute of Fundamantal Research, Mumbai, North-Eastern Indira Gandhi Regional Institute of Health and Medical Science, Shillong, National Brain Research Centre, Gurgaon, Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, Bangalore, Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad, Space Physics Laboratory, Thiruvanathapuram and Indian Institute of Remote Sensing, Dehradun.
  • The Central Educational Institutions (Reservation in Admission) Act, 2006, specifies the institutions of excellence as those involved in "niche research" and advanced study and research in subjects like nuclear physics.
  • Other central universities and colleges will have to implement the quota from 2019-20 session.
  • The order was passed by the Union Human Resource Development (HRD) ministry, to educational regulatory bodies as well as all states and Union Territories.
  • The scheme for implementing the quota should be displayed on the websites of all the concerned institutions by March 31.
  • The other institutions have been given the option of giving "representations" in case they face financial, infrastructure or academic constraints in applying the quota.
  • They can do so also in case the annual permitted strength in a branch of study or faculty cannot be increased immediately in the upcoming session. 
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