National Current Affairs – UPSC/KAS Exams – 22nd January 2019

19 amphibian species are critically endangered: ZSI list

Topic: Environment and Ecology

IN NEWS: An updated list of Indian amphibians was released on the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) website last week, with 19 species being treated as critically endangered and 33 species as endangered.

More on the Topic:

• Since 2009, the scientists of the ZSI in collaboration with other institutes have been updating the Indian amphibian checklist periodically. In 2009, the total number of species listed was 284. In 2010 it was 311, in 2011 it was 314, in 2012 and 2013 it was 342, in 2015 it was 384 and in 2017 it was 405 species.
• The list also notes if the species are in danger, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
• The current list bears the names of 432 amphibian species from India, the year of discovery and their IUCN ‘red list’ conservation status.
• Among the amphibians listed, 19 species are treated as critically endangered and 33 species as endangered.

Significance of Amphibians:

• Around 40% of amphibian species are threatened with extinction. Amphibians play an important role in nature – both as predators and prey.  They eat pest insects, which benefits agriculture around the world and helps minimise the spread of disease, including malaria.

About IUCN:

• The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN; officially International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources.
• It is involved in data gathering and analysis, research, field projects, advocacy, and education. IUCN’s mission is to “influence, encourage and assist societies throughout the world to conserve nature and to ensure that any use of natural resources is equitable and ecologically sustainable”.
• The organization is best known to the wider public for compiling and publishing the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, which assesses the conservation status of species worldwide.

Source: The Hindu

Climate ‘time bomb’ for groundwater is ticking

Topic: Environment and Ecology

IN NEWS: Future generations face an environmental “time bomb” as the world’s groundwater systems take decades to respond to the present day impact of climate change, scientists warned .

More on the Topic:

• Groundwater is the largest useable source of freshwater on the planet and more than two billion people rely on it to drink or irrigate crops.
• It is slowly replenished through rainfall — a process known as recharge — and discharges into lakes, rivers or oceans to maintain an overall balance between water in and water out.
• Groundwater reserves are already under pressure as the global population explodes and crop production rises in lockstep.
• But the extreme weather events such as drought and record rainfall — both made worse by our heating planet — could have another long-lasting impact on how quickly reserves replenish, according to a study published in Nature Climate Change .

• An international team of researchers used computer modelling of groundwater datasets to put a timescale on how reserves may respond to the changing climate.
• Only half of all groundwater supplies are likely to fully replenish or re-balance within the next 100 years — potentially leading to shortages in drier areas.
• This could be described as an environmental time bomb because any climate change impacts on recharge occurring now, will only fully impact the baseflow to rivers and wetlands a long time later
• The process through which rainwater is filtered through bedrock and accumulated underground can take centuries and varies greatly by region.

Way Forward:

• Artificial groundwater recharge is becoming increasingly important in India, where over-pumping of groundwater by farmers has led to underground resources becoming depleted.
• In 2007, on the recommendations of the International Water Management Institute, the Indian government allocated ₹1,800 crore (equivalent to ₹39 billion or US$540 million in 2017) to fund dug-well recharge projects (a dug-well is a wide, shallow well, often lined with concrete) in 100 districts within seven states where water stored in hard-rock aquifers had been over-exploited.
• Another environmental issue is the disposal of waste through the water flux such as dairy farms, industrial, and urban runoff.
• Wetlands help maintain the level of the water table and exert control on the hydraulic head. This provides force for groundwater recharge and discharge to other waters as well.

Source:The Hindu

Model mains question: Sustainable agriculture practices can reduce the depletion of ground water in India, Comment.

IMF cuts economic growth outlook

Topic: Economy

In news: IMF cuts economic growth outlook amid fears trade war, weak Europe could prompt sharp global slowdown.

More on the Topic:

• The International Monetary Fund cut its world economic growth forecasts for 2019 and 2020 owing to weakness in Europe and some emerging markets, and said failure to resolve trade tensions could further destabilize a slowing global economy.
• In its second downgrade in three months, the global lender also cited a bigger-than-expected slowdown in China’s economy and a possible “No Deal” Brexit as risks to its outlook, saying these events could worsen turbulence in financial markets.
• The IMF predicted the global economy to grow at a 3.5-per-cent pace in 2019 and 3.6 per cent in 2020, down 0.2 and 0.1 percentage point from last October’s forecasts, respectively.
• After two years of solid expansion, the world economy is growing more slowly than expected and risks are rising.

A global recession??

• But the risk of a sharper decline in global growth has certainly increased,” urging policy-makers to be ready for a “serious slowdown” by boosting their economies’ resilience to risks.
• Growth in the euro zone is set to moderate from 1.8 per cent in 2018 to 1.6 per cent in 2019, 0.3 percentage point lower than projected three months ago, the IMF said.
• The IMF also cut its 2019 growth forecast for developing countries to 4.5 per cent, down 0.2 percentage point from the previous projection and a slowdown from 4.7 per cent in 2018.

Concerns Of Emerging countries:

• Emerging market and developing economies have been tested by difficult external conditions over the past few months amid trade tensions, rising U.S. interest rates, dollar appreciation, capital outflows, and volatile oil prices.

Source: The Globe and Mail

Anti-EVM campaign

Topic: Science and Technology

In news: The Election Commission said it was examining the option of taking legal action on the claims made at a press conference in London that the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) used by the electoral body could be hacked and that the 2014 Lok Sabha polls were rigged.

More on the Topic:

• The ECI responded to the claim as, “It has come to the notice of the Election Commission of India that an event claiming to demonstrate EVMs used by ECI can be tampered with, has been organised in London. Whereas the ECI has been wary of becoming a party to this motivated slugfest, ECI firmly stands by the empirical facts about the foolproof nature of ECI-EVMs deployed in elections in India.
• It needs to be reiterated that these EVMs are manufactured in Bharat Electronics Limited and Electronics Corporation of India Limited under very strict supervisory and security conditions and there are rigorous standard operating procedures meticulously observed at all stages under the supervision of a committee of eminent technical experts constituted way back in 2010.

Why EVM are safe(According to ECI website)

• The microchip used in EVMs is a one-time programmable/ masked chip, which can neither be read nor overwritten. Hence, the program used in the EVMs cannot be reprogrammed in a particular manner.
• Furthermore, the EVMs are stand-alone machines which are not accessible remotely from any network are connected with any external devices and there is no operating system used in these machines.
• There is, therefore, absolutely no chance of programming the EVMs in a particular way to select any particular candidate or political party.

The controversies and outcomes:

• Since 2001, the issue of possible tampering of EVM has been raised before various High Courts.
• After detailed analysis of the various aspects of the technological security and administrative safeguards around the use of EVMs, the credibility, reliability and robustness of the EVMs has been validated by the various High Courts in all the cases.
• In some of these cases, the Hon’ble Supreme Court has also dismissed appeals filed by some petitioners against High Court orders, which were in favour of the EVMs.

Source: The Hindu

Pak. shares draft pact on Kartarpur Corridor

Topic: Art and Culture

In news: Indian and Pakistani officials will meet and discuss a “draft agreement” on the Kartarpur corridor in Punjab. The meeting follows the Pakistan government’s announcement that it had shared the draft of the agreement, to be signed by the two governments, for “facilitation of (Indian) Sikh Yatrees to visit the Gurudwara, Darbar Sahib Kartarpur, Narowal, Pakistan”.

More on the Topic:

• Kartarpur Sahib – The gurdwara in Kartarpur stands on the bank of River Ravi, about 120 km northeast of Lahore.
• Kartarpur Sahib is revered as Guru Nanak’s final resting place.
• It was here that Guru Nanak assembled a Sikh community and lived for 18 years until his death in 1539.
• Corridor – It is a long-standing demand from the Sikh community for easy access to the revered shrine across the border.
• The Kartarpur corridor was first proposed in 1999 when PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee took a bus ride to Lahore.
• It is now conceived as a visa-free corridor for Sikhs from India to Pakistan’s Kartarpur Sahib.
• It will be developed from Dera Baba Nanak village in Gurdaspur, Punjab to Gurdwara Darbar Sahib, Kartarpur.
• The length of the corridor is about 4 km, 2 km on either side of the International Border.

Source: The Hindu

Plastic waste imports to India go up

Topic: Environment and Ecology

In news:  In spite of a ban on the import of plastic waste into India, the influx of PET bottles has quadrupled from 2017 to 2018 , says a Delhi-based environmentalist organisation, Pandit Deendayal Upadhyay Smriti Manch (PDUSM).

More on the Topic:

• Indian firms are importing plastic scraps from China, Italy, Japan and Malawi for recycling and the imports of PET bottle scrap & flakes has increased from 12,000 tonnes in FY 16-17 to 48,000 tonnes in FY 17-18 growing @ 290%. India has already imported 25,000 MT in the first 3 months of FY 18-19.”
• Government and industry estimates suggest that India consumes about 13 million tonnes of plastic and recycles only about 4 million tonnes.
• A lack of an efficient waste segregation system and inadequate collection is the root cause, according to experts, for much of the plastic not making its way to recycling centres.
• To incentivise domestic plastic recycling units, the government had banned the import of plastic waste, particularly PET bottles in 2015. In 2016, an amendment allowed such imports as long as they were carried out by agencies situated in Special Economic Zones. It’s this loophole that’s been exploited.

Source: The Hindu

Saksham 2019

Topic: Government Policies

In news:  Saksham is an annual high intensity one-month long people-centric mega campaign of Petroleum Conservation Research Association (PCRA) under the aegis of Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas

More on the Topic:

• Various interactive programs and activities are being planned by PCRA, Public Sector upstream/downstream Oil & Gas companies during the month long ‘Saksham-2019’.
• PCRA is a national government agency engaged in promoting energy efficiency in various sectors of economy.
• It is a not for profit organization.
• It helps the government in proposing policies and strategies for petroleum conservation, aimed at reducing excessive dependence of the country on oil requirement.

Source: Pib