Current Affairs-November 11, 2022

 

INDIA

– India’s first national repository for life science data, the Indian Biological Data Center (IBDC), launched at Faridabad, Haryana

– Government amends Aadhaar rules; supporting documents need to be updated at least once by Aadhaar holders on completion 10 years from enrolment date

 ISRO increases payload capability of its heaviest rocket LVM3 (GSLV Mk-III) by up to 450 kg with successful engine test

– In affidavit in SC, Centre defends exclusion of Dalit Christians, Dalit Muslims from scheduled castes’ list

ECONOMY & CORPORATE

– Union Minister Bhupender Yadav launches online portal for ESIC Maternity benefits

– India hosted the 2nd BIMSTEC Agriculture Ministers meeting under the chairmanship of Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar

– Centre formulates action plan to promote exports of millets and value-added products of millets through APEDA (Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority)

– Reliance Jio launches 5G services in Bengaluru and Hyderabad

– India-U.S. CEO Forum held virtually; Forum chaired jointly by Piyush Goyal and Gina Raimondo, US Secretary of Commerce

WORLD

– World Science Day for Peace and Development was celebrated on Nov 10

– Pakistan govt to implement ‘interest-free’ banking system by 2027

SPORTS

– T20 Cricket World Cup: England (170/0 in 16) beat India (168 for 6 in 20) by 10 wickets in semifinal at Adelaide

– Uttar Pradesh to host Khelo India National University games in 2023-24

L’ORÉAL INDIA INVITES APPLICATIONS FOR ITS SCHOLARSHIP PROGRAMME ‘FOR YOUNG WOMEN IN SCIENCE’

 L’Oréal India today announced the latest edition of the ‘For Young Women in Science’ Scholarship (FYWIS) 2022, a nationwide merit-based scholarship programme providing a platform for aspiring girls to pursue their graduation in the field of science. L’Oréal India is inviting applications for the programme, of which the successful candidates will be granted a scholarship sum of up to INR 2,50,000 to cover their academic expenses. An extension of the international ‘L’ORÉAL UNESCO FOR WOMEN IN SCIENCE’ partnership, the programme recognizes the contribution of women in shaping the future of science by assisting and supporting them to fulfil their ambitions.

Instituted in 2003 in India, the ‘For Young Women in Science’ scholarship (FYWIS) programme empowers young women from lesser privileged backgrounds to pursue science-based graduation programs at any reputed academic institution of their choice. The programme is open for graduate studies in any field of science – pure sciences, applied sciences, engineering, and medicine, among others.

Krishna Vilasini Bharadwaj, Director – Corporate Affairs and Engagement, L’Oréal India said, “At L’Oréal, we believe women empowerment is a thing of real beauty, and we are committed to empowering women both inside L’Oréal and in the world around us. Today, great strides are being made to ensure equal representation in science and gaining access to STEM education remains incredibly challenging for women in India. By providing them with financial assistance, this scholarship aims to create avenues for meritorious girls to pursue varied scientific disciplines. Since its inception, the ‘For Young Women in Science’ scholarship programme has successfully empowered 485 young women in the field of science. We look forward to inspiring many more young minds and helping them build a bright future and contribute towards society.”

Eligibility criteria:

• Only girl students who have passed class 12 (Science stream) with a minimum of 85% marks in PCM/PCB/PCMB in the current academic year (2021-22) can apply for the scholarship
• The applicants must have procured admission into an undergraduate (bachelor’s) program in a science-related field at a recognized college/university in India in the current academic year, 2022-23
• The candidates’ annual family income should be less than INR 6 Lakh

How to apply:

• Interested applicants can apply for this scholarship through the link L’Oréal Scholarship
• The applicant needs to register first by using their Email/Mobile/Gmail account (if not already registered)
• Candidate will be redirected to L’Oréal India’s ‘For Young Women in Science’ scholarship application form page.
• Fill in the required details in the online application form.
• Upload the necessary documents as part of the application process.
• Read the ‘Terms and Conditions’ and indicate your acceptance to move ahead towards submitting the application

After screening and shortlisting of the applications received, the selected candidates undergo a telephonic interview round, after which the selected candidates along with their parents are invited for a face-to-face interview with a jury comprising eminent scientists, academicians, journalists, etc. This year, the jury round will be organized in a hybrid mode – candidates will have the option of in-person at locations like Mumbai, New Delhi/NCR, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Kolkata, or attend virtually.

For further information, candidates may call 011-430-92248 (Ext- 117) (Monday to Friday – 10:00 AM to 6 PM) or email fywis-loreal@buddy4study.com

Source: indiaeducationdiary, 30/08/22

Helping hand

 Hundreds of women self-help groups are transitioning into micro or small social enterprises in an antagonistic market economy, providing a national template with umpteen possibilities.

About two decades ago, V. Malleshwaramma, a woman farmer in her mid-forties with a small farm, would double up as a footloose labourer. Today, she heads an all-women, organic farmers’ company with 250 shareholders in Andhra Pradesh’s Kadapa district, aggregating and processing an array of pesticide-free farm produce — from ragi to paddy to perishables — and sending it to big cities like Hyderabad. What began as a self-help group running on a thrift fund grew in size and transitioned into a robust collective after relentless hard work, training and exposure. The group is part of a growing social enterprise, Sahaja Aharam, which is a federation of 60 collectives and producer companies with nearly 10,000 farmers scattered over Andhra and Telangana.

Cut to Balangir, western Odisha’s once-impoverished and out-migration district: Hundreds of women members of self-help groups are running micro, small and big enterprises as part of the state’s Mission Shakti initiative, a convergence of rural livelihoods missions. A women’s empowerment programme that began in 2001 is now a separate state department with the government outsourcing its services and goods to the women SHGs across Odisha, enrolling nearly 8.5 million women members. In Balangir, the SHGs now provide an array of services and run multiple enterprises — from a running cafeteria to managing a government-run guest house to producing mid-day meals to operating a roaring handloom unit to agro-allied activities, transforming groups that were once mere thrift fund managers into social enterprises.

Women there are also handling the urban waste management — from doorstep garbage collection to production of compost to selling it in the open market. Travel to Kerala, and you’ll be astonished to see the quiet but incredible work that goes on in the Kudumbashree collective, a Kerala initiative for women’s empowerment and poverty alleviation. Women members of Kudumbashree make a steady income from multifaceted activities; they run micro or individual enterprises, or collective businesses with sustainability at their core. In Kerala, women’s neighbourhood groups are building eco-housing and setting up examples in construction.

In Osmanabad, Maharashtra, a 10-year-old self-help group formed by single women has recently graduated into a producers’ company, taking baby steps into a world of cut-throat competition. Vrundavani Patil, the president, lost her husband 10 years ago and set up a group to support single women, from which sprouted this company. She told me that her company can’t be seen as merely an economic enterprise but one that has social responsibilities. It lends support to single women and tries to create economic opportunities that are otherwise hard to come by.

A quiet, if arduous, transformation is happening across India. Hundreds of women SHGs are transitioning into micro or small social enterprises in an antagonistic market economy, providing a national template with umpteen possibilities. The movement is still in its infancy nearly 25 years since SHGs became a serious programmatic imperative. Most of these groups aren’t productive or income-generating. At the last count, about 80 million women are part of SHG networks in India. The problem is that most groups have no access to capital to achieve scale and growth and a level playing field to compete in unfair terrain.

Investing in them should be a national priority; it will yield a bumper socio-economic harvest, as many productive SHGs are demonstrating. India needs a carefully crafted plan for the next three to four decades to make the women SHGs that are part of the national or state rural or urban livelihood missions productive and sustainable. That would usher us into a real double-engine economy.

Jaideep Hardikar

Source: The Telegraph, 11/11/22

What is the Mangrove Alliance for Climate, which India joined at COP27?

 

The Mangrove Alliance for Climate seeks to educate and spread awareness worldwide on the role of mangroves in curbing global warming and its potential as a solution for climate change.

At the 27th Session of Conference of Parties (COP27), this year’s UN climate summit, the Mangrove Alliance for Climate (MAC) was launched with India as a partner on Tuesday (November 8). The move, in line with India’s goal to increase its carbon sink, will see New Delhi collaborating with Sri Lanka, Indonesia and other countries to preserve and restore the mangrove forests in the region.

Attending the event in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt on Tuesday, Union Minister for Environment Forest and Climate Change Bhupender Yadav said that India is home to one of the largest remaining areas of mangroves in the world — the Sundarbans — and has years of expertise in restoration of mangrove cover that can be used to aid global measures in this direction.

The MAC

An initiative led by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Indonesia, the Mangrove Alliance for Climate (MAC) includes India, Sri Lanka, Australia, Japan, and Spain. It seeks to educate and spread awareness worldwide on the role of mangroves in curbing global warming and its potential as a solution for climate change.

Mariam bint Mohammed Almheiri, UAE’s Minister of Climate Change and the Environment, while launching the alliance, said that her country intends to plant 3 million mangroves in the next two months, in keeping with UAE’s COP26 pledge of planting 100 million mangroves by 2030.

“Increasing reliance on nature-based solutions is an integral element of the UAE’s climate action on the domestic as well as international level, therefore, we seek to expand our mangrove cover,” she said, as per a report in Dubai-based news channel Al Arabiya. “We are pleased to launch MAC jointly with Indonesia, and believe it will go a long way in driving collective climate action and rehabilitating blue carbon ecosystems,” she added.

However, the intergovernmental alliance works on a voluntary basis which means that there are no real checks and balances to hold members accountable. Instead, the parties will decide their own commitments and deadlines regarding planting and restoring mangroves. The members will also share expertise and support each other in researching, managing and protecting coastal areas.

The significance of mangroves

Mangroves have been the focus of conservationists for years and it is difficult to overstate their importance in the global climate context. Mangrove forests — consisting of trees and shrub that
live in intertidal water in coastal areas — host diverse marine life. They also support a rich food web, with molluscs and algae-filled substrate acting as a breeding ground for small fish, mud crabs and shrimps, thus providing a livelihood to local artisanal fishers.

Equally importantly, they act as effective carbon stores, holding up to four times the amount of carbon as other forested ecosystems. Mangrove forests capture vast amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and their preservation can both aid in removal of carbon from the atmosphere and prevent the release of the same upon their destruction.

The current state of the mangroves

South Asia houses some of the most extensive areas of mangroves globally, while Indonesia hosts one-fifth of the overall amount. India holds around 3 percent of South Asia’s mangrove population. Besides the Sundarbans in West Bengal, the Andamans region, the Kachchh and Jamnagar areas in Gujarat too have substantial mangrove cover.

However, infrastructure projects — industrial expansion and building of roads and railways, and natural processes — shifting coastlines, coastal erosion and storms, have resulted in a significant decrease in mangrove habitats.

Between 2010 and 2020, around 600 sq km of mangroves were lost of which more than 62% was due to direct human impacts, the Global Mangrove Alliance said in its 2022 report.

ndia at COP

Unlike other world leaders — US President Joe Biden and UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak — Prime Minister Narendra Modi has skipped this edition of the conference, with Union Minister Bhupender Yadav representing India instead. Yadav has said that India’s focus currently is on concessional and climate-specific grants to drive climate finance, and has teamed up with Brazil, South Africa and China (the BASIC bloc) to negotiate agreements.

Demands by various negotiating blocs

As seen in the previous sessions of the climate conference, building consensus among the 190+ countries who are members of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is a tough task. China, for instance, has ramped up the use of coal amidst energy security risks and rising tensions with Taiwan. Its deteriorating relationship with the US, the second-biggest emitter of greenhouse gas behind Beijing, has further complicated possibilities of negotiations. The European Union, which negotiates as a single entity for its 27 members, is at the lower end of the spectrum of gas emitters, but is under pressure to ease its resistance to its staunch position

against the issue of ‘loss and damage’, which calls for rich and developed countries to compensate poorer, developing countries who are disproportionately affected by the effects of climate change. 

G77 and China is the largest intergovernmental organisation of developing countries in the UN. Pakistan, which currently chairs the group and faced devastating floods this year, will lead the group in its demand for a dedicated fund for compensation from wealthy countries, Reuters reported. The Climate Vulnerable Forum, which represents 58 countries that are disproportionately affected by the consequences of climate change such as Bangladesh and Maldives, reportedly demands a dedicated fund in which rich polluting nations help bear the costs of “loss and damage”.

Written by Navmi Krishna

Source: Indian Express, 11/09/22

Quote of the Day November 10, 2022

 

“In order to succeed you must fail, so that you know what not to do the next time.”
Anthony J. D'Angelo

“सफल होने के लिए आपको असफलता का स्वाद अवश्य चखना चाहिए, ताकि आपको यह पता चल सके कि अगली बार क्या नहीं करना है।”
एंथनी जे. डीएंजेलो

Current Affairs- November 10, 2022

 

INDIA

– 19 Indian universities among top 200 in QS Asia Universities Ranking 2023; IIT Bombay best at 40th

– Private channels to have 30-min slot for ‘national & public interest’ programmes daily

Statehood day of Uttarakhand celebrated on Nov 9; state carved out of UP in 2000

– EAM S. Jaishankar holds talks with Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov in Moscow

– EAM Jaishankar holds bilateral talks with Belarusian counterpart Vladimir Makei in Delhi

– Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat releases Dynamic Ground Water Resource Assessment Report

– Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Hardeep Singh Puri launches Transport 4 All Challenge Stage-2 and Citizen Perception Survey 2022

– Atal Innovation Mission launches women centric challenges under ANIC (Atal New India Challenge) program

ECONOMY & CORPORATE

– Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman approves Sovereign Green Bonds framework to attract investment in environmentally sustainable & climate-suitable projects

– Govt to exit Axis Bank with 1.55% stake sale, expects to garner Rs 4,000 cr

– Centre allows trade settlement for export promotion schemes in Indian rupee

– National Payments Corporation introduces BHIM App open-source license model

– Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone (APSEZ) acquires 49.38% stake in Indian Oiltanking for Rs 1,050 cr

WORLD

– CDRI (Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure) announces Infrastructure Resilience Accelerator Fund at COP27 being held at Sharm El-Sheikh in Egypt

– Russia says withdrawing from Ukraine’s city of Kherson and nearby areas

– International Week of Science and Peace being observed from Nov 9 to 14

SPORTS

– ICC T20 World Cup: Pakistan (153/3 in 19.1) beat NZ (152/4 in 20) in semifinal in Sydney

Insider tips to build a successful startup from scratch: A guide for entrepreneurs

 In the contemporary world, initiating a business requires minute in-depth understanding and knowledge of many subjects, which also includes legal, sales, financial, marketing, liability protection, intellectual property protection, and human resources. However, if entrepreneurship is something that interests you then there are also stories of incredible success of early stage startups which have turned into multi-billion dollar organisations such as Uber, Facebook, WhatsApp, and Airbnb. To understand the entire process of investing and building a big business right from scratch, our start-up expert Ravi Ranjan shares his insights on what an entrepreneurial mindset should look like.

1. Is there anything called a startup mindset? If yes, what are few of the elements of those?

I think the fundamental of having a career as a founder is realising that it's not the first time that there are startups coming up in India or anywhere. There have been businesses around us for thousands of years. But, I believe that there are fundamentally two reasons as to why startups have become a movement in recent times. Firstly, we have a very large population who are currently online. This means that organisations now have an opportunity to discover their audience very fast. Lastly, another difference between a business and a startup is that the latter can scale up very fast. So, for a young student who is just about to start their career, a keen observation of how the ecosystem is evolving might be of great help. I believe in a class full of students there are always some students who will have an interest in talking about technology, AI, crypto or something like that. These are the people who have leadership qualities and the entrepreneurship mindset to take it further. However, people who have a traditional mindset and wish to become an entrepreneur need to start figuring out these trends to develop an entrepreneurial mindset.

2. You mentioned, it is very easy for a startup to scale up and grow into a big business but in the past there have been instances where a startup has faced challenges or even closed down. What are your views on that?

I strongly believe that it is not just with startups but with everything in life, be it going to a college or managing a family, one can fail in anything. But how one deals with it depends upon how mature they are as a person or what capabilities they have to move ahead in life. There are challenges everywhere but the reward is also extremely high once you take risks. One of the biggest advantages of building a startup is that you will never fail but always end up learning as to how things work. If one looks at some of the big businesses in the world, it's not their first attempt; the founders always had 2-3 companies in the past that did not work out. Not everyone becomes successful in the first go and entrepreneurship is not for the faint hearted. I believe young students need to understand that every disappointment is going to train you on how to not give up. Young entrepreneurs need to be 5 times more courageous than their friends and peers.

3. What are some of the reasons an organisation fails?

I feel there are three fundamental reasons as to why an organisation fails. To avoid the same, before they start, students must do enough research. Secondly, they also need to analyse and understand whether their business needs funding immediately or can they manage without funding for a certain period of time. Lastly, they should have the expertise as to how to exactly scale a business. For example, if an entrepreneur is starting a small startup in Kolkata–is he or she able to scale the business to multiple cities? If not they are not going to be successful.

4. Do you think young students should worry about having a safety net when they are eventually starting on their own or they should be fully focused on what they are doing?

As an individual I feel different people have different challenges. In the case of some students their family expects them to start earning as soon as they finish their college. For them I feel they should not be giving time to a startup without having a safety net. On the other hand, 90% of students are also not in that category and they can absolutely take risks for the first few years. I believe that if one really wants to be successful they should have zero backup plans. They should be 100% focused on the startup they are building and in some cases, students should also take the initiative of starting from the second or third year of the college itself so that by the time they finish college, they would either have a successful company or a lot of experience to hold upon. Eventually there is nothing to lose as a young student as they only end up learning.

5. Do you think a business can be started with zero funds?

Yes, there are businesses that can be initiated with zero external funding. Though this is true for about 60% of all businesses today. For instance, one of the very successful organisations today, Zoho, was started without any external funding.

6. What are some other insights you can share with young professionals who are looking to start a business?

One of the most important things is that they must understand the market they are going to target. For instance, if they are building something on web3 or metaverse, they must understand the market well. Here, I don’t mean that they must be an expert, but at least they must know how big the market is and at the same time they must also have a few members in their team who compliment their skills.

7. What are some of the non negotiable things which a young student must consider before beginning a business?

I think the most crucial thing to bear in mind before beginning a business is that nobody should start a business just because there is funding available. A startup venture should be initiated to solve a problem. If a business is solving a problem right from its initial days then it is good to go and if not then it is totally non negotiable. Furthermore, a young student should also make it a point to be ethical and have the utmost integrity without compromising on it. Lastly, not bringing your 100% to the table when working on a startup is also a non negotiable quality.

8. How can a young student make it easier for themselves to approach someone for funds?

India has more than ten thousand angel investors in the current time, clearly indicating that our country has the best opportunities for people to invest in the present period and future as well. Students today have the option to raise money from the government, angel investors, private equities, grants, business plan competitions and many more. I believe a young student can make it easier for themselves by preparing a list of top investors via researching on the internet as everything is available for free, and then start reaching out to them on Linkedin and meeting them at different events. Initially a young student should speak more about their ideas rather than pushing the prospective investors to put money on their business. I believe by following these steps a student can get an investor interested in their business idea.

A startup ecosystem uplifts the future of any country. It is often seen that a small company with big ideas turns out to be more innovative when weighed against a lot of big companies and as our expert Ravi Ranjan says, if you are ethical, have integrity and are looking to solve a problem in the long term, you are good to go.

 

Source: Nancy Jaiswal

Telegraph India, 8/11/22