Daily Current Affairs including Notes - 27 April

💥WORLD BANK LOAN FOR BIOPHARMA MISSION (SCHEMES)

The Union Government has entered into agreement with World Bank for flexible financing arrangement to accelerate research towards early development for biopharmaceuticals under National Biopharma Mission.

Under the agreement government has secured a loan of about Rs. 1,600 crore from the World Bank to develop new vaccines, medical devices and medicines and will be disbursed over five years under the Biopharma Mission.

The agreement was signed between project implementing agency, Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC) and International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) on behalf of World Bank.

👉About National Biopharma Mission

The mission was launched by Ministry of Science & Technology in 2017 for five years with 50% funding through World Bank Loan, to make India hub for design and development of novel, affordable and effective biopharmaceutical products such as vaccines, biologics and medical devices for combating public health concerns.

The mission aspires to create a conducive ecosystem to encourage entrepreneurship and indigenous manufacturing in the sector by strengthening technology transfer capabilities in the private and the public sector.

It will provide a holistic and integrated approach to strengthen and support entire product development value chain for accelerating research leads to product development. This will help not only in immediate product development for addressing public health needs, but also help to create ecosystem which will facilitate development of continuous pipeline of products.

The mission will concentrate on development of specific products such as vaccines, medical devices, biotherapeutics and diagnostics etc. Besides, it will also work on establishment of shared infrastructure and facilities. It will help in building and strengthening domain specific knowledge and management skills at the same time creating and enhancing technology transfer capabilities in public and private sector.

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💥‘INDIA TO LOSE IF OIL PRICES CLIMB MORE’ (ECONOMY)

India, and other emerging economies like Turkey and the Philippines, will be a loser if the recent oil price rise continues, according to a Nomura report.

The global crude oil prices has seen a rise following production limitation agreement by the OPEC countries. This supply side-driven increase in crude oil prices is likely to spur a major differentiation in emerging markets’ performance, hurting large net oil importers with weak economic fundamentals (turkey, Ukraine etc.), possibly by more than it benefits large net oil exporters.

For India, the rising oil prices risk reversing the improving economic fundamental ‘sweet spot’ experienced during 2014-16 due to extremely cheap oil prices, at a time when economy is facing challenges in the forms of concerns over pre-election populist government policies, the costs of cleaning up the banking sector and the lack of progress in rejuvenating private investment.

👉Impact on Current account deficit

Due to the unfavorable trade balance CAD has always been a major concern for Indian economy. And it is estimated that every $10/barrel rise in oil price would worsen the current account balance by 0.4% of GDP, increase inflation by 30-40 basis points (bps), hurt growth by 15 bps and worsen the fiscal balance by 0.1% of GDP, thus affecting or worsening every macroeconomic indicators of the economy.

And with inflation the Monetary policy would further become tighter leading to fall in investments and thus slowing down of economy.

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💥‘STATES UNABLE TO IMPLEMENT FARMER PRICE SUPPORT SCHEMES’ (AGRICULTURE)

The Additional Managing Director of the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India (NAFED) has ruled out the Centre’s proposals to decentralise price support schemes for farmers as not viable since State governments do not possess the infrastructure or willingness required to implement them.

States lacks in many areas to full fill the demand, they fail to maintain a revolving fund from which they can pay farmers over the 10-day window before they receive payment from the Centre; some also lack storage space, adequate number of procurement centres, and trained surveyors etc.

👉Public procurement system in the country

Under the government procurement of agri products schemes the Centre government declares minimum support prices (MSP) for 23 crops.

While paddy and wheat farmers can depend on the Food Corporation of India (FCI) to procure their crops at the MSP rates, the system is less widespread for other crops. Though NAFED is responsible for the procurement of oilseed, pulses and copra under the current Central price support scheme, the State governments must request the Centre to step in and procure the harvest when prices fall below the MSP.

So although the full cost of the scheme is borne by the Government of India, and the NAFED, it’s up to the states to make use of the scheme effectively.

And hence as per a new proposal made by Niti Aayog and communicated to States last month, the center wanted to shift the responsibility of procurement of oilseeds, pulses and coarse cereals from Center to the States.

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💥NEW FROG SPECIES TAKES HISTORICAL NAME OF GOA (ENVIRONMENT)

Scientists have identified a new species of frog called Fejervarya goemchi, in the highland plateaus of the Western Ghats parts of Goa.

The scientists have identified the species using a combination of morphology, geographic distribution range and molecular methods since most Fejervarya species in South and South-East Asia are difficult to identify on the basis of morphology alone.

The new species, named after the historical name of the state of Goa, where the species is discovered are large-sized terrestrial frogs. They sit next to water bodies making calls to attract females for mating and breeding. Though most of these frogs are terrestrial, they need water bodies to survive. The new species was found in high elevation areas of laterite plateaus, temporary water bodies and paddy fields of Goa.

The new finding indicates that Goa’s lesser-known amphibian biodiversity still needs serious documentation as new species are being described almost every year by researchers.

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💥GOOGLE TO MENTOR START-UPS ADDRESSING LOCAL PROBLEMS (PRELIMS)

Google has introduced an India-focused mentoring programme ‘Solve for India’ to support start-ups addressing local problems

The programme focuses on bringing the best of Google expertise across product and user experience design and interface including access to technologies like AI and ML.

And in this regard it will provide start-ups technology support for deploying artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) tools to build solutions for India in areas such as agriculture, healthcare, retail and education.

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