August 20 and 21st Current Affairs

1.NERAMAC revival and Oil Palm Mission

IN NEWS:

 Recently, The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA), chaired by the Prime Minister has approved a revival package of Rs.77.45 crore for revival of North Eastern Regional Agricultural Marketing Corporation Limited (NERAMAC),

KEY POINTS:

On the same day, the Union Cabinet also approved the National Mission on Edible Oils – Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) as a new Centrally Sponsored Scheme with a special focus on the North east region and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

About NERAMAC

• NERAMAC is a central Public Section Enterprises under the administrative control of Ministry of Development of North Eastern Regional (MDoNER).
• NERAMAC was set up to support farmers/producers of North East getting remunerative prices for their produce and thereby bridge the gap between the farmers and the market and also to enhance the agricultural, procurement, processing and marketing infrastructure of the North-eastern Region of India.
• Its objective is to undertake development and marketing of horticultural products within and outside the north eastern region and the supply of inputs, tools, equipment etc. required for the development of horticulture and agro-based industries.
• The revival of NERAMAC will ensure remunerative prices to the farmers and provide better farming facilities and training to the farmers of the North Eastern Region.

About National Mission on Edible Oils – Oil Palm (NMEO-OP)

• NMEO-OP was set up with the special emphasis on India’s north-eastern states and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands due to the conducive weather conditions in the regions, under which oil palm farmers will be provided financial assistance and will get remuneration under a price and viability formula.
• Its objective is to achieve self-reliance in edible oil by reducing import dependency of palm oil, thereby benefitting oil palm farmers & create employment generation.
• The Mission aims to increase the area under cultivation for Oil Palm by an additional area of 6.5 lakh hectare (ha.) thereby reaching the target of 10 lakh hectares in the next 5 years.

SOURCE:PIB

2. DRDO develops Advanced Chaff Technology for Indian Air Force.

IN NEWS:

Defence Research & Development Organisation (DRDO) has developed an Advanced Chaff Technology to safeguard fighter aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) against hostile radar threats.

KEY POINTS:

• The technology has been given to the industry for production in large quantities to meet the annual rolling requirement of the Indian Air Force.
• Defence Minister has lauded DRDO, IAF and the industry for indigenous development of this critical technology, terming it as one more step of DRDO towards ‘AatmaNirbhar Bharat’ in strategic defence technologies.

Chaff technology:

• Chaff is an electronic countermeasure technology used by militaries worldwide to protect naval ships, aircraft or other sensitive targets from radar and radio frequency (RF) guiding mechanisms of the enemy missile.
• Chaff is composed of many small aluminium or zinc coated fibres stored on-board the aircraft in tubes. In case the aircraft feels threatened by any radar tracking missiles, chaff is ejected into the turbulent wake of air behind the plane.
• The chaff deployed in the air reflect as multiple targets for the missile guidance systems, thus misleading the enemy radars or deflecting adversary missiles.
• The purpose is to confuse radar-guided or infrared-guided anti-aircraft missiles fired so that they could be diverted.
• The importance of this technology lies in the fact that very less quantity of chaff material deployed in the air acts as decoy to deflect enemy’s missiles for ensuring safety of the fighter aircraft.

SOURCE:PIB

3. Cascade Frog.

IN NEWS:

Recently, a team of researchers have discovered a new species of cascade frog in Arunachal Pradesh named Adi Cascade Frog.

Earlier, a new frog species named Minervarya Pentali was discovered in the Western Ghats.

KEY POINTS:

About:

• It is a predominantly brown colour frog, with a size ranging roughly between 4 cm to 7 cm.
• It is formally described as Amolops adicolasp.nov., which is morphologically distinguished from its congeners by a suite of characters that include adult size, body colouration and markings, skin texture, snout shape, foot webbing and digit tip morphology.
• Naming:
• It has been named Adi Cascade Frog (Amolops Adicola) after the indigenous Adi tribe living in the Adi hills of Arunachal Pradesh. The literal meaning of Adi is “hill” or “mountain top.
• Historically, this region was also known as Abor hills.
• Cascade Frog
• Cascade frogs are named so because of their preference of small waterfalls or cascades in flowing hill streams.
• Cascade Frogs belong to the genus Amolops.
• The genus Amolops is one of the largest groups of ranid frogs (family Ranidae) with currently 73 known species that are widely distributed across Northeast and North India, Nepal, Bhutan, China, through Indochina, to the Malay Peninsula.

SOURCE:TH

4. ‘ZyCov-D’ vaccine.

IN NEWS:

The Drug Controller General has granted emergency approval to the Zycov-D, a COVID-19 vaccine.

This is the fifth vaccine, after Covishield, Covaxin, Sputnik V and Moderna to be approved for use in India.

KEY POINTS:

About Zycov-D

• Zycov-D is a COVID-19 vaccine developed by the Ahmedabad based Zydus Cadilla group and is the first vaccine in India that can be administered to adults as well as those 12 and above.
• It’s also the only DNA-based vaccine in the world and can be administered without a needle, purportedly minimizing chances of reactions.
• The vaccine has been developed in partnership with the Department of Biotechnology under the ‘Mission COVID Suraksha’.
• The three-dose vaccine once administered produces the spike protein of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and elicits an immune response.
• The plug-and-play technology on which the plasmid DNA platform is based can be easily adapted to deal with mutations in the virus, such as those already occurring.

SOURCE:PIB

5. BRICS deal on cooperation in remote sensing satellite data sharing.

IN NEWS:

BRICS Nations- Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa- signed a deal for cooperation in remote sensing satellite data sharing.

KEY POINTS:

• According to the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), this deal will enable the space agencies of BRICS nation to build a virtual constellation of specified remote sensing satellites through which ground stations will receive data.
• This agreement was signed on August 18, 2021 under India’s BRICS Chairship.

About BRICS

• BRICS nations are the major emerging economies who are known for their significant influence on regional affairs. Government of BRICS have been meeting annually since 2009 at formal summits. 12th BRICS summit was the latest edition which was hosted by Russia on November 17, 2020 virtually amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Originally, there were a grouping of BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China). South Africa was added to the grouping in 2010 to change the acronym to BRICS.
• BRICS nations have a combined area of 39,746,220 km2 with an estimated t population of around 3.21 billion. 
• Area accounts for 26.656% of the world land surface while population accounts for 41.53% of the world population. Four members out of five are among world’s ten largest countries by population as well as by area. Only South Africa is at 24th position with respect to both.

SOURCE:TH

6. Register of Indigenous Inhabitants of Nagaland (RIIN).

IN NEWS:

Nagaland Chief Minister has sought to reduce fears over an exercise similar to Assam’s National Register of Citizens.

KEY POINTS:

What is Register of Indigenous Inhabitants of Nagaland?

• The RIIN will be the master list of all indigenous inhabitants of the state.
• Objective: To prevent outsiders from obtaining fake indigenous certificates for seeking jobs and benefits of government schemes.
• The RIIN will be prepared after an extensive survey with the help of a village-wise and ward-wise list of indigenous inhabitants based on official records.
• It will be prepared under the supervision of each district administration.
• No fresh indigenous inhabitant certificate will be issued after the RIIN is completed except for children born to the State’s indigenous inhabitants who will be issued indigenous certificates along with birth certificates. The RIIN database will be updated accordingly.
• The RIIN will also be integrated with the online system for Inner-Line Permit, a temporary document non-inhabitants are required to possess for entry into and travel in Nagaland.
• The entire exercise will be monitored by the Commissioner of Nagaland. In addition, the state government will designate nodal officers of the rank of a Secretary to the state government.

SOURCE:IE