Showing posts with label Geography. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Geography. Show all posts

Wednesday, 28 October 2015

Punjab: Unsustainable Agricuture

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From the breadbasket of India, Punjab has become a basket-case economy.
  • Endowed with ample water and good soil, Punjab’s happy, progressive people had a dream that is now a distant memory.
  • The Centre’s policies aimed at increasing food production to ensure an adequate supply of grain, coupled with export restrictions, have taken a toll.

Sunday, 11 October 2015

Habitat III - UN conference on housing and sustainable urban development

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urban2-main
Source: The Indian Express

About Habitat III

  • The UN General Assembly convenes it
  • 1st meeting
    • Vancouver 1976
    • Urban Population 40%
  • 2nd meeting
    • Istanbul 1996
    • Urban Population 45%
  • 3rd meeting
    • Quito, Ecuador 2016 
    • 54 per cent

India's Focus

  • Inclusiveness, efficiency, sustainability and empowering the local governments.
  • SDG Goal 11: “Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable”.
Problems

  •  India still doesn’t have a comprehensive national urban and habitat policy and this is happening because Urban development has always been a state subject and states have never bothered to define a vision. 
    • What has centre done so far?
      • Earlier - National Urban Renewal Mission and Rajiv Awas Yojana
      • Now - five recently-launched missions of 
        • Smart Cities, 
        • AMRUT, 
        • HRIDAY 
        • Swachh Bharat
        • Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana. 
  • Financial
    • Despite the 74th amendment, enacted in 1993, that delegated greater powers to urban local bodies, the scrapping of revenue sources such as octroi has greatly reduced the capacity of municipal bodies when it comes to self-funding. 
    • Moreover, the essential nature of the services provided by ULBs, such as water supply and sanitation, makes it difficult to tap those for revenue sources. With the depleting powers of the urban local bodies in terms of revenue share, the final focus area of ’empowering local governments’ assumes greater urgency

Monday, 7 September 2015

First National Drugs Map

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  • Why in news?
    • The first-ever official exercise to map the drug menace in India, on the orders of the Supreme Court, has revealed that of the 51.4 lakh kg of narcotics confiscated across the country over the last 10 years, only 16 lakh kg were destroyed.
    • Rajasthan alone recorded 23 per cent of the total haul with 11.81 lakh kg seized under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, followed by 
      • Punjab (9.2 lakh kg), 
      • Madhya Pradesh (8.04 lakh kg) and 
      • Tamil Nadu (6.57 lakh kg).

Friday, 4 September 2015

Saturday, 29 August 2015

Friday, 24 July 2015

Wednesday, 22 July 2015

Monday, 13 July 2015

Landslide Dams | New SOPs by MHA

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Landslide Dam (agu.org)

Why in news?
The home ministry has specified new standard operating procedures or SOPs to monitor the dams, which are also created mainly due to earthquakes, leading to a natural damming of a river by mass wasting.

 What are Landslide dams?

Monday, 6 July 2015

Sunday, 5 July 2015

Friday, 3 July 2015

Thursday, 2 July 2015

Wednesday, 1 July 2015

Tuesday, 30 June 2015

Saturday, 20 June 2015

Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission

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Why in news?
  • The Union Cabinet today approved a five-fold increase in the country's solar power capacity target to 100,000 MW by 2022, entailing an investment of Rs 600,000 crore, to make India one of the largest green energy producers. 
    • target will principally comprise of 40 GW rooftop and 60 GW through large and medium-scale grid-connected solar power projects 

Tuesday, 16 June 2015

The 'Bru' Issue | The tribe, Repatriation, IDPs or Refugees

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map
Source: Indian Express

Why in news?
The process of repatriation of displaced Bru tribals from Tripura to Mizoram that began in 2010 is set to be wound up. The final repatriation process began on June 2, 2015. But like earlier attempts, this phase too has seen little success. 


Who are Bru (Reangs)?

The Bru people (also referred to as Reangs), were inhabitants of Mizoram who were displaced from Mizoram in 1997 on account of ethnic conflicts. Most of the Brus (Reangs) were originally resident of about 100 habitations in Mammit Sub-Division of Aizawl District. Reang or Riangare are one of the 21 scheduled tribes of the Indian state of Tripura.

Saturday, 13 June 2015

INSTC - International North-South Transport Corridor

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Why in news?
13 members of the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) recently reviewed the status of the dry run study between India, Iran and Russia via the Caspian Sea.
  • The dry run between Nhava Sheva (Mumbai) – Bandar Abbas (Iran) – Baku (Azerbaijan) and Nhava Sheva – Bandar Abbas (Iran) – Amirabad (Iran) – Astrakhan (Russia) via the Caspian Sea was conducted in August last year.
The Foreign Trade Policy of India, 2015-20, has also highlighted the importance of INSTC in expanding India's trade and investment links with Central Asia.   


 Also, India and Central Asia's biggest country Kazakhstan held talks in Delhi to bolster INSTC, in June 2015.
INSTC

Tuesday, 9 June 2015

Tackling Asia’s resource issues

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Issue involved
  • Asia's growing significance manifested by it being now the world's largest creditor and main economic locomotive. And so is its insatiable appetite for natural resources which has led to resource competition between Asia's economies within Asia and far beyond in other continents. 
  • There is also domestic resource crunch forcing countries to rely on imported mineral ores, timber and fossil fuels, bringing international supplies under pressure and triggering price volatility. 

Friday, 5 June 2015

New river found in Bay of Bengal

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What's the news?
  • Uncommon geographical feature of River in sea has been found with the help of fishermen who helped in carrying out observations for almost 10 years. 
  • It has been meandering its way along the eastern coast of the Bay of Bengal (BoB) after summer monsoon
How it works?
  • In one line
    • The peculiar geography of the northern Indian Ocean that resulted in both a massive inflow of freshwater into the semi-enclosed northern BoB and the strong coastally trapped currents along the eastern coast of India were responsible for the formation of the river