17-18-10-21 Daily-Karnataka-KPSC Current Affairs

The Health and family welfare department conducted 23.8 lakh tele-counselling sessions including 15 lakh Covid-19 patients and eight lakh people who were in quarantine since the pandemic hit in March 2020.

Of the total sessions, seven lakh were during the peak of the second wave in May this year, when most patients worried about securing hospital beds. Besides Covid patients and those in quarantine and isolation, those counselled included Covid patients who required treatment and therapy for anxiety and depression, healthcare workers and migrant labourers.

When the pandemic hit Karnataka, the decided to proactively get in touch with those testing positive and those who were required to stay in isolation or quarantine and offer psychological support. Migrant labourers too were counselled when they were stuck during the nationwide lockdown. Multiple calls were made to patients requiring follow ups.

Giriraj Singh, Minister of Rural Development & , launched the CRISP-M tool virtually.

Highlights:

The CRISP-M tool has been launched to combine the Climate information in the Geographic Information System (GIS) based watershed planning under the MGNREGA and develop climate resilience.

This tool will help fix climate information in GIS-based planning and implement Mahatma Gandhi NREGA (MGNREGA).

CRISP-M tool has created this tool with the help of the British Government and all the stakeholders.

This tool will start up new opportunities for rural communities in dealing with the Climate Change issue.

Production Linked Incentive Scheme was launched on 14 October, for Telecom & Networking Products.

Highlights:

The PLI Scheme was launched by the Minister of State of the Ministry of Communication, Devusinh Chauhan.

This scheme was launched to help reduce India’s dependence on other countries for importing telecom and networking products.

The PLI Scheme in the telecom sector is being launched by DoT to boost the Home Manufacturing of telecom and networking products.

Manufacturing will be supported by incentivising incremental expenses and turnover. This scheme was launched with a total expenditure of Rs 12,195 crore.

The scheme is effective from 1 April 2021. The made by applicants in India between 1 April 2021 to FY 2024-25 will be eligible.

The scheme provides support for 5years from FY 2021-22 to FY 2025-26.

A team of scientists from India have used tea and banana waste to prepare non-toxic activated carbon.

This is useful in industrial pollution control, water purification, food and beverage processing, and odour removal.

The newly developed process avoids using any toxic agent for synthesizing activated carbon, thus making the product cost-effective and non-toxic.

The structure of tea was beneficial for conversion to high-quality activated carbon, but it involves using solid acid and bases, which is toxic; hence a non-toxic method of conversion was needed.

The Global Hunger Index 2021 was released on 14 October, and India is 101 rank in the Index with an alarming hunger level.

Highlights:

The Global Hunger Index is published by an Irish aid agency called Concern Worldwide and a German organisation called Welt Hunger Hilfe.

India has been placed in the 101st position out of 116 countries, while in 2020, it was in the 94th position.

The GHI Score of India is 28.8 27.5 between 2012 and 2021, decreased from 38.8 in 2000.

India has improved concerning indicators like under-5 mortality rate, the prevalence of undernourishment and prevalence of stunting among children.

GHI is a means to measure and track hunger across the world, by region and country.

It is calculated yearly, and its results are published in a report issued in October.

GHI score is calculated based on four-pointers,

Undernourishment

Child wasting (share of children under five who are wasted, i.e., those with low weight for their height.

Child stunting (children aged under five who have low height for their age.

Child mortality (mortality rate of children aged under five).

Takachar’s Innovations, an Indian Project, won the “Prince William’s inaugural Earth shot Prize”, also called “Eco Oscars.

Highlights:

The Project recycled the agricultural waste into Fuel and was led by Vidyut Mohan.

The project was awarded for its affordable technology and reduction of smoke emissions by 98 per cent.

Vidyut Mohan was awarded for this technology in the “clean our air category”.

This technology will mitigate the challenge of getting rid of USD 120 billion of agricultural waste generated around the world annually.

The International Day For Eradication Of POVERTY is commemorated On 17 October to recognize the efforts and struggles faced by people who live in poverty.

Highlights:

The first commemoration of “International day for Eradication of Poverty” took place in Paris, France, in the year 1987.

Poverty was declared a violation of Human Rights on 17 October 1987 by people assembled at the Trocadero in Paris to honour the victims of extreme poverty, hunger and violence.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was approved in 1948, and on 22 December 1992, the UN General Assembly adopted 17 October as “International Day for the Eradication of Poverty”.

NASA launched the first-of-its-kind mission on October 16, 2021, to study the Trojan asteroids of Jupiter.

Highlights

Trojan asteroids are two large clusters of space rocks, considered pieces of primordial material forming <a href="https://exam.pscnotes.com/the-solar-system”>The Solar System‘s outer planets.

The space probe is called Lucy and it has been packed inside a unique cargo capsule lifted from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

The Lucy spacecraft was carried by an Atlas V rocket from United Launch Alliance (UAL).

Lucy mission is a 12-year expedition that will study a record number of asteroids.

The first mission will be to explore the Trojans, and Spacecraft will journey to eight different asteroids.