Daily Current Affairs for 2nd August 2021

DAILY NEWS ANALYSIS (2^nd August 2021)

(Source: The Hindu, Indian Express, The Economic Times, PIB, etc

GS PAPER II

United Nation Security Council

Why in News

On 1^st August, 2021, India got the presidency of United Nation Security Council for the month of August.

Key Points

• India is now set to organise key events in three major areas of maritime security, peacekeeping and counter-terrorism.
• As per the new role, India will decide the UN body’s agenda for the month and coordinate important meetings on a range of issues.
• Security Council will also have on its agenda several important meetings including Syria, Iraq, Somalia, Yemen, and the Middle East.
• Security Council will also be adopting important resolutions on Somalia, Mali, & UN Interim Force in Lebanon.
• Apart from meeting on maritime security, peacekeeping and counter-terrorism, India will also be organising a solemn event in memory of peacekeepers.
• In 75 years of Independence, this is the first time India has invested in presiding over an event of UNSC. It shows that leadership wants to lead from the front.
• It also shows that India & its political leadership are invested in UNSC foreign policy ventures.
• This was a first meeting of India and United Nation. So, it is historic. The last time an Indian PM was engaged in this effort was the then Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao in 1992 when he attended a UNSC meeting.
• This will be the country’s first presidency during its 2021-22 tenure as a non-permanent member of the Security Council.

India at United Nation Security Council

• India was among the original members of the United Nations that signed the Declaration by United Nations at Washington, D.C. on 1^st January 1942.
• As a founding member of the United Nations, India strongly supports the purposes and principles of the UN and has made significant contributions in implementing the goals of the Charter, and the evolution of the UN’s specialised programmes and agencies.
• India has been a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council for eight terms with the most recent being the 2021–22 term.
• India began its two-year tenure as a non-permanent member of the UNSC on January 1^st 2021.
• India is a member of G4, group of nations who back each other in seeking a permanent seat on the Security Council and advocate in favour of the reformation of the UNSC.
• India is a charter member of the United Nations and participates in all of its specialised agencies and organizations.

United Nation Security Council

• The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) is one of the six principal organs of the United Nations (UN).
• Five other principal organs are: The General Assembly, the Trusteeship Council, the Economic and Social Council, the International Court of Justice, and the Secretariat.
• It was established under the UN Charter in 1945 with its headquartered at New York.
• Its principal objective is to maintain international peace and security.
• The UNSC consist 15 members in which 5 of them are permanent.
• The five permanent members are: The United States, the Russian Federation, France, China and the United Kingdom.
• The ten elected or non-permanent members have a tenure of two years.
• At present, the non-permanent members are Estonia, India, Ireland, Kenya, Mexico, Niger, Norway, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Tunisia and Vietnam and they have no rights of veto.

GS PAPER II

Hunger Hotspots

Why in News

According to the two UN agency, hunger is expected to rise in 23 global hotspots in the next three months with the highest alerts for “catastrophic” situations in Ethiopia’s embattled Tigray region, southern Madagascar, Yemen, South Sudan and northern Nigeria.

Key Points

• The Food and Agriculture Organisation and World Food Program said in a new report on “Hunger Hotspots” between August and November that “acute food insecurity is likely to further deteriorate.”
• Ethiopia put at the top of the list, saying the number of people facing starvation and death is expected to rise to 4,01,000 which is the highest number since the 2011 famine in Somalia.
• In southern Madagascar, which has been hit by the worst drought in the past 40 years, pests affecting staple crops, and rising food prices, 14,000 people are expected to be pushed into “catastrophic” acute food insecurity marked by starvation and death by September.
• Acute hunger is increasing not only in scale but also severity.
• Overall, over 41 million people worldwide are now at risk of falling into famine or famine-like conditions, unless they receive immediate life and livelihood-saving assistance.
• The two Rome-based agencies called for urgent humanitarian action to save lives in the 23 hotspots, saying help is especially critical in the five highest alert places to prevent famine and death.

FAO-WFP Hunger Hotspots report

• The FAO-WFP Hunger Hotspots report is a forward-looking, early warning analysis of countries and situations, called hotspots, where acute food insecurity is likely to deteriorate over the coming months.
• These hotspots are identified through a consensus-based analysis of key drivers of food insecurity, and their likely combination and evolution across countries and regions.
• According to the FAO and WFP, South Sudan, Yemen and Nigeria remain at the highest alert level, joined for the first time by Ethiopia because of Tigray and southern Madagascar.
• In South Sudan, “famine was most likely happening in parts of Pibor county between October and November 2020, and was expected to continue in the absence of sustained and timely humanitarian assistance” while two other areas remain at risk of famine.
• In Yemen, the risk of more people facing famine-like conditions may have been contained, but gains remain extremely fragile.
• In Nigeria, populations in conflict-affected areas in the northeast may be at risk of reaching catastrophic food insecurity levels.
• Nine other countries also have high numbers of people facing “critical food insecurity” coupled with worsening drivers of hunger: Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Central African Republic, Colombia, Congo, Haiti, Honduras, Sudan and Syria.
• Six countries have been added to the hotspot list since the agencies’ March report: Chad, Colombia, North Korea, Myanmar, Kenya and Nicaragua.
• Three other countries also facing acute food insecurity are Somalia, Guatemala and Niger, while Venezuela wasn’t included due to lack of recent data.
• In Afghanistan, FAO and WFP stated that 3.5 million people are expected to face the second-highest level of food insecurity, characterized by acute malnutrition and deaths, from June to November.
• In a report in May, 16 organizations including FAO and WFP said at least 155 million people faced acute hunger in 2020, including 133,000 who needed urgent food to prevent widespread death from starvation, a 20 million increase from 2019.

GS PAPER II

Lakshadweep beach villa plan

Why in news

The Lakshadweep administration is pressing ahead with plans to construct beach and lagoon villas on three islands of the Union Territory with its fragile coral ecosystem.

Key Points

• A tender notice inviting proposals from developers for building 370 villas using the design, build, finance, operate and transfer (DBFOT) model on public-private-partnership (PPP) basis on Minicoy, Kadmat and Suheli islands was issued by the managing director of the Society for Promotion of Nature Tourism and Sports (SPORTS).
• A group of concerned scientists and researchers had petitioned the administration in 2020 detailing why the NITI Aayog­led project will be ecologically disastrous and socio­economically ill-considered.

Lagoons as insurance

• The lagoon is a vital ‘insurance site’ protecting the islands’ land and freshwater supply.
• Lagoon coral patches are temperature adapted and serve as refugia for climate disturbed outer reefs in Lakshadweep.
• The planned lagoon development will destroy, permanently modify and pollute large areas of the lagoon and its ecosystems.
• The beaches being cultural and ecological spaces for the islanders, the project would be detrimental to the interests of the local community as well.
• Apart from being vital as nesting sites for several species of turtle, it is a multi­use environment for fish processing, copra processing, boat landing, fish sale, recreation and other critical social functions.
• Having access to the beach is critical to island life. Even beaches on uninhabited islands like Suheli are heavily used through the fair season for fish processing.

75-year rights

• According to the tender notice and draft concession agreement, the plan is to award to the successful bidder exclusive rights over 8.54 hectares of land and 6 hectares of lagoon on Minicoy; 5.557 hectares of land and 6 hectares of lagoon on Kadmat; and 3.823 hectares of land and 6 hectares of lagoon on Suheli island; for a period of 75 years to build and operate these villas.
• The proposed built-up area for the luxury project in Minicoy will be 13,702.5 sq. metres on land (110 beach villas) and 5,020 sq. metre (40 floating villas) on the lagoon; in Kadmat it will be 10,823 sq. metre area on land (75 beach villas) and 4,500 sq. metre (35 floating villas) on water; and in Saheli 9,945 sq. metre on land (60 beach villas) and 6,300 sq. metre (50 floating villas) on water.

GS PAPER III

e-RUPI

Why in News

On 2^nd August, 2021, India will launch an electronic voucher based digital payment system “e-RUPI”.

Key Points

• The platform, which has been developed by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), Department of Financial Services, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and the National Health Authority, will be a person-specific and purpose-specific payments system.

e-RUPI

• e-RUPI is a cashless and contactless digital payment medium, which will be delivered to mobile phones of beneficiaries in form of an SMS-string or a QR code.
• This will essentially be like a prepaid gift-voucher that will be redeemable at specific accepting centres without any credit or debit card, a mobile app or internet banking.
• e-RUPI will connect the sponsors of the services with the beneficiaries and service providers in a digital manner without any physical interface.
• The system has been built by NPCI on its UPI platform, and has onboarded banks that will be the issuing entities.
• Any corporate or government agency will have to approach the partner banks, which are both private and public-sector lenders, with the details of specific persons and the purpose for which payments have to be made.
• The beneficiaries will be identified using their mobile number and a voucher allocated by a bank to the service provider in the name of a given person would only be delivered to that person.

Use cases of e-RUPI

• 
• According to the government, e-RUPI is expected to ensure a leak-proof delivery of welfare services.
• It can also be used for delivering services under schemes meant for providing drugs and nutritional support under Mother and Child welfare schemes, TB eradication programmes, drugs & diagnostics under schemes like Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana, fertiliser subsidies etc.
• Even the private sector can leverage these digital vouchers as part of their employee welfare and corporate social responsibility programmes.

Significance of e-RUPI

• The government is already working on developing a central bank digital currency and the launch of e-RUPI could potentially highlight the gaps in digital payments infrastructure that will be necessary for the success of the future digital currency.
• In effect, e-RUPI is still backed by the existing Indian rupee as the underlying asset and specificity of its purpose makes it different to a virtual currency and puts it closer to a voucher-based payment system.
• Also, the ubiquitousness of e-RUPI in the future will depend on the end-use cases.

Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC)

• The Reserve Bank of India has been working towards a phased implementation strategy for central bank digital currency or CBDC, digital currencies issued by a central bank that generally take on a digital form of the nation’s existing fiat currency such as the rupee.
• Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDCs) are desirable not just for the benefits they create in payments systems, but also might be necessary to protect the general public in an environment of volatile private VCs.
• Although CBDCs are conceptually similar to currency notes, the introduction of CBDC would involve changes to the enabling legal framework since the current provisions are primarily synced for currency in paper form.

GS PAPER III

Goods and Services Tax (GST)

Why in news

India’s gross GST revenues in July recovered sharply to ₹1,16,393 crore, after slipping below the ₹1 lakh crore mark for the first time in eight months in June.

Key Points

• The government stated that the collections a sign of a rapid economic recovery from the second COVID-19 wave, though economists said they indicate an ‘incomplete’ rebound.
• The gross Goods and Services Tax (GST) revenues in July recovered sharply to ₹1,16,393 crore, after slipping below the ₹1 lakh crore mark for the first time in eight months in June.
• With the easing out of COVID restrictions, GST collection for July 2021 has again crossed ₹1 lakh crore, which clearly indicates that the economy is recovering at a fast pace.
• The robust GST revenues are likely to continue in the coming months too.
• The July numbers include returns filed between July 1 and 5, amounting to ₹4,937 crore, as taxpayers were given relief on delayed return filing for June in the wake of the second wave.
• The July collections were 33% higher than a year ago, with the GST collected on the import of goods rising 36% and domestic transactions, including import of services, growing by 32%.
• There is a heartening sequential increase, as well as a substantial year­on­year growth, but GST collections remain well below the all-time high recorded in April of ₹1.41 lakh crore.

Significant variations

• While most States reported positive growth in tax collections compared with July 2020, there were significant variations — Odisha and Jharkhand reported a 54% uptick, followed by Haryana (53%) and Maharashtra (51%), while Tamil Nadu and Gujarat clocked 36% growth.
• Kerala reported a 27% surge in GST revenues, despite having stricter COVID­19 restrictions in place than States such as Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal and Rajasthan which recorded a growth of 18%, 15% and 12%, respectively.
• The pace of growth across the States was highly uneven in July 2021, with some industrial heavyweights recording a sharp expansion.
• The Ministry attributed June’s blip in GST revenues at ₹92,849 crore, after posting above the ₹1 lakh crore mark for eight successive months, to the complete or partial lockdowns in most States and Union territories in May.
• The improvement in GST collections both on domestic transactions and imports, accompanied by the fact that major producing States have shown significant increases, would indicate that the economic activities have resumed across the country.