Daily Prelims Notes 28 December 2023

December 28, 2023
Posted by: OptimizeIAS Team
Category: DPN

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Daily Prelims Notes

28 December 2023

Table Of Contents

1. Grow local, eat local: Bengal farmers hold a celebration of indigenous seeds

Subject : Environment

Section: Agri & SD

Context:

Indigenous seed festival held in Contai, West Bengal, organized by ActionAid, Kajla Janakalyan Samiti, and Purba Medinipur Kisan Swaraj Samity.

Details:

Hundreds of farmers from various districts participated, showcasing native varieties of paddy, pulses, and vegetables.
Purpose: Pledge to conserve diverse native seeds, exchange traditional knowledge, and promote sustainable farming practices.
The festival is a part of ActionAid’s climate justice campaign, facilitating discourse between farmers on climate change, organic farming, and indigenous seed access.
- ActionAid’s focus on climate resilience and sustainable farming across 22 Indian states.
The NGOs aim to establish grassroots-level seed banks across West Bengal.
Radha Tilak, an aromatic rice variety, highlights seeds’ potential for safe food, biodiversity preservation, and local economic stimulation.

Recent Government Initiatives Related to Sustainable Agriculture:

Mission Organic Value Chain Development for North Eastern Region (MOVCDNER)
National Mission on Sustainable Agriculture
Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY)
Sub-mission on AgroForestry (SMAF)
Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana

Source: The Hindu

2. Interlinking of rivers could flood India’s freshwater with invasive fish

Subject : Environment

Section: Biodiversity

Context:

New research shows that India’s ambitious Interlinking of Rivers (ILR) programme can spread invasive, alien fish to water bodies that are home to endangered fish species, posing ecological, economic, and livelihood threats.

Details:

About a third (31%) of the total area in India provides suitable habitat for invasive alien fish.
The major river basins of Pennar, Kaveri, Godavari, Krishna and Mahanadi that spread across central and southern India were found to be highly vulnerable to invasion.
The river interlinking in India would establish connectivity routes and help expand the range of potentially invasive species, especially in areas rich in threatened endemic species, such as the northeast India the Western Ghats and the Sundarbans.

Threat to biodiversity:

Invasive species affect biodiversity and ecosystems by increasing competition for food and taking up space which, coupled with changing biotic environments, habitat degradation and pollution, often negatively affects native species populations.
- In the case of invasive fish, which may display aggressive territorial behaviour, it can cause a decline in the number of native fish, which in turn, affects fishing livelihoods.
Globally, habitat destruction, increasing aquaculture and the introduction of ornamental species are altering freshwater ecosystems.

Some invasive fishes are:

Gambusia, native to the USA and Poecilia from South America, are widely used in mosquito control. Pterygoplichthys are popular ornamental fish. Tilapia and Cyprinus carpio are invasive species in the Ganga River system.
Hypophthalmichthys nobilis, native to China, has a suitable habitat in the Narmada, Mahi, Mahanadi, Kaladan, Irrawaddy, Godavari, Ganges, and Damodar river basins.

River Interlinking Project:

The Indian Rivers Inter-link is a proposed large-scale civil engineering project that aims to effectively manage water resources in India by linking Indian rivers by a network of reservoirs and canals to enhance irrigation and groundwater recharge, reduce persistent floods in some parts and water shortages in other parts of India.
India accounts for 18% of the world population and about 4% of the world’s water resources. One of the solutions to solve the country’s water woes is to link rivers and lakes.
The Inter-link project has been split into three parts: a northern Himalayan rivers inter-link component, a southern Peninsular component and starting 2005, an intrastate rivers linking component.
The project is being managed by India’s National Water Development Agency (NWDA), Ministry of Jal Shakti.
NWDA has studied and prepared reports on 14 inter-link projects for Himalayan component, 16 inter-link projects for Peninsular component and 37 intrastate river linking projects.

3. The Sahara Desert Used To Be a Green Savannah and New Research Explains Why

Subject : Environment

Section: Biodiversity

Context:

Algeria’s TassiliN’Ajjer plateau is Africa’s largest national park.
Over 15,000 etchings and paintings are exhibited there, some as much as 11,000 years old according to scientific dating techniques, representing a unique ethnological and climatological record of the region.

The Green Sahara or North African Humid Period:

It was a period approximately 6,000-11,000 years ago.
There is widespread climatological evidence that during this period the Sahara supported wooded savannah ecosystems and numerous rivers and lakes in what are now Libya, Niger, Chad and Mali.
Using marine and lake sediments, scientists have identified over 230 of these greenings occurring about every 21,000 years over the past eight million years.
These greening events provided vegetated corridors which influenced species’ distribution and evolution, including the out-of-Africa migrations of ancient humans.
These dramatic greenings would have required a large-scale reorganisation of the atmospheric system to bring rain to this hyper-arid region.

Why has North Africa greened approximately every 21,000 years over the past eight million years?

It was caused by changes in the Earth’s orbital precession – the slight wobbling of the planet while rotating. This moves the Northern Hemisphere closer to the sun during the summer months.
This caused warmer summers in the Northern Hemisphere, and warmer air is able to hold more moisture. This intensified the strength of the West African Monsoon system and shifted the African rain belt northwards. This increased Saharan rainfall, resulting in the spread of savannah and wooded grassland across the desert from the tropics to the Mediterranean, providing a vast habitat for plants and animals.

Earth’s changing orbit:

The Earth’s orbit around the sun isn’t constant due to gravitational effects from celestial bodies like the moon and planets, causing Milankovitch cycles.
These cycles impact the solar energy received by the Earth, the eccentricity of the Earth’s orbit, the tilt of the Earth’s axis (obliquity), and ice ages on Earth.
The third Milankovitch cycle, or precession, involves Earth’s wobble on its axis across 21,000 years. This cycle significantly correlates with periods of increased humidity.
Precession affects seasonal differences, intensifying them in one hemisphere while reducing them in the other.
This change triggers more rainfall in North Africa during warmer Northern Hemisphere summers, initiating humid phases and promoting vegetation growth across the region.

Eccentricity and the ice sheets:

The eccentricity cycle determines how circular Earth’s orbit is around the sun.
The eccentricity indirectly influences the magnitude of the humid periods via its influence on the ice sheets.

Significance of the Sahara region:

The Sahara acts as a gate. It controls the dispersal of species between north and sub-Saharan Africa, and in and out of the continent.
The gate was open when the Sahara was green and closed when deserts prevailed.

Significance of the study findings:

It shows the sensitivity of this gate to Earth’s orbit around the sun.
High-latitude ice sheets may have restricted the dispersal of species during the glacial periods of the last 800,000 years.

Source: The Wire

4. Significant climate milestones of 2023

Subject : Environment

Section: Climate change

Hottest Year in History:

2023 is likely to be declared the hottest year, exceeding the previous record of 2016 by 0.1°C and surpassing pre-industrial levels by 1.43°C.
Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) data highlights the sustained high temperatures throughout the year.

Unprecedented Sea Surface Temperatures:

Marine heat waves, occurring when ocean temperatures exceed 90% of past observations, were widespread in 2023, affecting 48% of global oceans.
Global sea surface temperatures remained exceptionally high.

Antarctic Sea Ice Extent at Record Low:

Antarctic sea ice experienced historically low growth in 2023, with an annual maximum extent of 16.96 million sq. km in September, the lowest since 1979.

Record Carbon Dioxide Levels:

Global carbon dioxide emissions hit a new high in 2023, albeit with a slight plateau due to decreased deforestation, increasing by 1.1% from the previous year.

Creation of Loss and Damage Fund:

COP28 initiated the first loss and damage fund for climate change impacts, established at the start of the conference in December.
The fund, housed at the World Bank but managed independently, received $792 million in pledges from governments, falling short of the needed billions.

Climate Impact of Food Systems Addressed:

At COP28,134 countries pledged to tackle the climate impact of the food industry, representing over 70% of global food consumption and 76% of related emissions.
However, critics noted the absence of specific quantitative targets in this historic declaration.
Countries also signed the Declaration on Climate and Health. (India didn’t sign it).
- The COP28 Declaration on Climate and Health is a non-binding, non-negotiated call to action and collective commitment that reflects the concerns and common position of countries on the importance of health within climate discourse and in the COP process.

5. Fiscal slippage due to higher spending in MGNREGA

Subject :Economy

Section: Fiscal Policy

Fiscal Slippage Warning:
- Despite robust tax collections, India Ratings and Research express concerns about a possible fiscal slippage in FY24.
Deficit Projection:
- Forecasts the fiscal deficit for FY24 to be 6%, exceeding the budgetary target of 5.9%.
Factors Contributing to Slippage:
- Higher-than-budgeted revenue expenditure.
- Expected first and likely second supplementary demand for grants.
- Lower-than-budgeted nominal GDP.
Revenue Collections Impact:
- Anticipates fiscal slippage despite favorable tax and non-tax revenue collections.
Offsetting Measures:
- Higher revenue collections deemed insufficient to offset lower-than-budgeted divestment proceeds.
Fertilizer Subsidy Adjustment:
- Highlights an adjustment in the fertilizer subsidy, increasing it from the budgeted ₹44,000 crore to ₹57,360 crore due to exhaustion of the budgeted amount by end October 2023.
MGNREGA Expenditure Surge:
- Demand for employment under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA).
- Expenditure till December 19 exceeds the budgeted ₹60,000 crore, reaching ₹79,770 crore.
- Additional allocation of ₹14,520 crore through the first supplementary demand for grants.
Budgetary Challenges:
- Indicates challenges in adhering to the budgetary targets due to increased spending on subsidies and employment guarantee schemes.
Nominal GDP Impact:
- Cites lower-than-budgeted nominal GDP as a contributing factor to the fiscal slippage.
Concerns Despite Collection Growth:
- Despite handsome growth in tax collections, concerns arise from higher expenditures in key sectors.

MGNREGA

MGNREGA stands for Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. It is a social security scheme that aims to provide livelihood and employment security in rural areas of India.

Here are the key features and objectives of MGNREGA:

Employment Guarantee: MGNREGA guarantees at least 100 days of wage employment in a financial year to every rural household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work.
Scope of Work: The Act focuses on the execution of works related to water conservation, drought relief, and land development. Other permissible works include rural connectivity, flood control, and infrastructure development.
Right to Work: MGNREGA emphasizes the legal right to work for rural households, ensuring that they have the option of seeking employment when needed.
Equal Wages: The wages provided under the scheme are to be paid at a rate defined by the central government. There is a provision for equal wages for men and women.
Financial Inclusion: Payment of wages is done through bank or post office accounts to ensure transparency and prevent leakages.
Gram Panchayat Role: The Gram Panchayat is responsible for planning and executing the works under MGNREGA. Social audits are also conducted to ensure transparency and accountability.
Sustainable Development: The Act aims to create durable assets and enhance the livelihood security of the rural population. This involves focusing on works that have a long-term impact on the development of rural areas.
Women Empowerment: MGNREGA gives special emphasis on the participation of women in the workforce. At least one-third of the beneficiaries must be women.

6. Force Majeure Request Due to Flood Impact on Chennai and Thoothukudi Ports

Subject :Economy

Section: Fiscal Policy

Unprecedented Rains and Floods:
- Chennai and Thoothukudi ports faced heavy losses and disruptions in maritime trade due to unprecedented rains in Tamil Nadu.
Force Majeure Appeal:
- Trade members involved in port operations have urged the Chennai Port Authority and VOC Chidambaranar Port Authority to declare Force Majeure at Chennai and Thoothukudi ports, respectively.
Federation of Association of Stevedores Appeal:
- The Federation of Association of Stevedores has requested the VOC Port Authority to consider December 11, 12, and 13 as non-working days due to the impact of heavy rains.
Force Majeure Situation:
- The association emphasized that the heavy rain and its consequences have created a Force Majeure situation, preventing stevedores from working and causing delays and penalties.
Challenges Faced:
- Reduction in migrant labor essential for stevedores.
- Delays in deliveries and receipts affecting ship turnaround.
- Industries shut down, leading to challenges in receiving or delivering goods to/from the port.
Tuticorin Stevedores Association’s Perspective:
- Unprecedented rainfall starting on December 16 and subsequent floods.
- Vessel operations suspended from December 17.
- Industries shut down, hindering goods transportation.
- Request to consider the situation as an Act of God and declare Force Majeure until normalcy is restored.
Demurrages and Storage Issues:
- Accumulation of demurrages due to delayed pick-up and delivery.
- Inability to fulfill contracts and pay demurrage and storage costs.
Process for Force Majeure Declaration:
- While the port authority itself cannot declare Force Majeure, it can recommend it to the Ministry.
- The Ministry, upon recommendation, will issue a Gazette Notification.

About Force Majeure

Force Majeure is a legal term that refers to unforeseeable circumstances or events beyond the control of parties involved in a contract that may excuse non-compliance with the contractual obligations. These events are often considered “acts of God” or “acts of nature.”

Force Majeure clauses are typically included in contracts to address situations where performance becomes impossible or impractical due to unexpected and uncontrollable events.

Key points about Force Majeure:

Unforeseeable Events: Force Majeure events are those that could not have been anticipated or controlled by the parties when entering into the contract. These events are often outside the reasonable control of the affected party.
Excusing Performance: When a Force Majeure event occurs, the affected party may be excused from performing its contractual obligations, either temporarily or, in some cases, permanently.
Contractual Provision: Force Majeure is usually addressed in a specific clause within a contract. This clause outlines the types of events that qualify as Force Majeure, the obligations of the parties during such events, and the potential remedies available.
Examples of Force Majeure Events: Common examples of Force Majeure events include natural disasters (such as earthquakes, floods, hurricanes), wars, strikes, acts of terrorism, and government actions that impact contractual performance.

7. India, Russia-led Eurasian bloc to begin negotiations on FTA soon

Subject : IR

Section: Groupings

Context: India, Russia-led Eurasian bloc to begin negotiations on FTA soon

More about the news:

India and the Eurasian Economic Union (EaEU), led by Russia, are poised to initiate negotiations on a free trade agreement (FTA) aimed at bolstering India’s exports to the region, particularly in engineering goods, electronics, and agriculture.
During a meeting in Moscow, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and Russian Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov discussed enhancing India’s engagement with the Russian Far East and affirmed plans for FTA negotiations.
Discussions on the FTA between India and the EaEU, comprising Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Armenia, and Kyrgyzstan, began in early 2020 but were delayed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Despite recent resumed talks, negotiations are still pending.

Some facts about Eurasian Economic Union (EaEU):

The Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) is an economic union of states located primarily in Northern Eurasia.
The Eurasian Economic Union consists of five member states : Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Armenia.
It was formed in
The EEU aims to optimize the flow of goods and services among its member nations by coordinating policies and regulations, thereby creating a single economic space.

8. India eyes $1 billion in banana exports in next five years

Subject : Geography

Section: Economic geography

Context:

With the successfully export of a trial shipment of fresh bananas to the Netherlands through sea route, India is now aiming at increasing the exports of this fruit to $1 billion in the next five years.

Key Facts:

India is world’s largest banana producer. Despite it, India’s global export share is just 1%, though the country accounts for 26.5% of the world’s production.

About Banana

Agro-climatic requirements:
- Banana, basically a tropical crop, grows well in a temperature range of 15ºC – 35ºC with relative humidity of 75-85%.
- Deep, rich loamy soil with pH between 6.5 – 7.5 is most preferred for banana cultivation.
- Saline solid, calcareous soils are not suitable for banana cultivation.
- There are some 12-15 varieties of bananas in India.
- Largely in the peninsular southern coastal region, namely in parts of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, and Bengal, and in the Northeastern areas of the country such as Assam and Arunachal Pradesh.
- The central and northern regions – Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, and Punjab also grow the plant but neither in such variety nor in numbers.
- India produces about 29 million tonne of banana every year, and next is China with 11 million.
Nutritive value
- Bananas have 10-20 mg of calcium, 36 mg of sodium, 34 mg of magnesium and 30-50 mg of phosphorous per 100 g of edible material.
- All these make bananas highly nutritious.
Its peel is of use as a ‘biochar,’ which is used both as a fertilizer and to generate electricity.
- Biochar is a charcoal-like substance that’s made by burning organic material from agricultural and forestry wastes (also called biomass) in a controlled process called pyrolysis.
- Pyrolysis is the heating of an organic material, such as biomass, in the absence of oxygen.

9. For Huntington’s disease clues, scientists are looking in fruit flies

Subject: Science and Tech

Section: Health

Context: Researchers from Hungary, genetically engineered fruit flies (Drosophila melanogaster) to express the polyglutamine tract of a mutated human HTTgene in their nervous system by using a gene called Gal4 from baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae).

More on news:

The medical genetics clinic at the Nizam’s Institute of Medical Sciences, Hyderabad sees three to four patients with Huntington’s disease every month.

About Huntington’s disease:

Genetic / Inherited: Huntington’s disease (HD) is an inherited disorder that causes nerve cells (neurons) in parts of the brain to gradually break down and die.
Affects neural system: The disease attacks areas of the brain that help to control voluntary (intentional) movement, as well as other areas.
Causes: A gene called HTT are involved in the production of a protein called huntingtin.
Mutation: When these genes mutate, they provide faulty instructions leading to production of abnormal huntingtin proteins and these form into clumps.
The clumps disrupt the normal functioning of the brain cells, which eventually leads to death of neurons in the brain, resulting in Huntington disease.
Treatment: Treatment consists of supportive therapy to manage symptoms
Cure: No cure exists, but drugs, physiotherapy and speech therapy can help manage some symptoms.

About Glutamine repeats:

Mutated version of Htt:The patient’s misfortune is that they carry a mutated version of a gene called HTT. The HTT gene codes for a protein called huntingtin, or Htt.
Destroys Neural systems: Nerve cells requires the Htt protein for their normal functioning and survival. The mutated gene which encodes an abnormal Htt protein that instead destroys the neurons that regulate movement, thinking, and memory.
Inheritance: Each one of us has two copies of the HTT gene of which one is inherited from the father and one from the mother. The disease is triggered even if only one copy of the gene is mutated while the other is normal.

Clues from fruit flies

Recent study: In the new study from Hungary, the researchers genetically engineered fruit flies (Drosophila melanogaster) to express the polyglutamine tract of a mutated human HTTgene in their nervous system.

About GaIp and UAS:They used a gene called Gal4 from baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae), containing information with which cells manufacture a protein called Gal4p. This protein binds specifically to a short DNA sequence called the upstream activating sequence (UAS)

Gene expression: DNA sequence for the Gal4p protein when is placed downstream of a fly gene called elav, leading to expression of the Gal4p protein in all of the fly’s neurons Expressing the longer tract produced symptoms in the fruit flies resembling those of Huntington’s disease in humans while on the other hand expressing the shorter tract did not.

The Science of Yod1 gene: On investigating 32 genes it was found that excessive expression – or overexpression – of gene called Yod1, removed all of the disease-like effects in the flies including the neurodegeneration, impediments to motor activity, and lower viability and longevity.

10. Will Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) revolutionize lunar landing

Subject : Science and Tech

Section: Space tech

Context: On December 25, Japan’s Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) spacecraft entered into orbit around the moon and will land on January 19.

More on news:

Japan will become the fifth country to soft-land a robotic craft on the natural satellite
SLIM’s success or failure will also affect the upcoming Chandrayaan 4 mission.
India succeeded with its Chandrayaan 3 mission in August 2023 to demonstrate end-to-end capability in safe landing and roving on the lunar surface.

About SLIM:

Spacecraft: SLIM is a spacecraft built and launched by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) on September 7, 2023
Low Weight: It weighed only 590 kg at launch(one-seventh of Chandrayaan 3 3,900 kg at launch).
Counterparts:SLIM was launched with XRISM which is a next-generation X-ray space telescope which is onboarded an H-2A rocket.
Other global missions: JAXA launched SLIM only two weeks after the surface component of India’s Chandrayaan 3 mission succeeded and Russia’s Luna 25 spacecraft failed.

SLIM and its path to moon:

4 months: SLIM took four months because it followed a longer but more fuel-thrifty route based on weak-stability boundary theory.
Kinetic energy:Once it is launched into an orbit around the earth ,SLIM will swung around the planet multiple times in order to build up its kinetic energy with each swing.
Deflection in moon’s direction: On getting nearer to the moon,SLIM instead of slowing down and being captured by the moon’s gravity, it allowed itself to be deflected in the moon’s direction .This deflection is the result of the combined forces exerted by the earth and the moon.
About Hiten: Physicists worked it out in the late 1980s for another JAXA mission, called ‘Hiten’.

SLIM and its objective:

Moon sniper: SLIM’s standout feature is its reputation as the “moon sniper” as it will try to land within 100 meters of its chosen landing site which is an unusually tight limit given the history of moon-landing missions.
For example, the ‘Vikram’ lander of Chandrayaan 3 landed at a spot 350 meters away from a predetermined one.
Soft land: SLIM will attempt to soft-land with the smallest ever area tolerance on the moon. The chosen site is near the Shioli Crater, at 13.3º S and 25.2º E., SLIM will use data from JAXA’s SELENE orbiter, which ended in 2009.
Lower mass: Its lower mass ( only 120 kg excluding fuel) will help in this endeavor by rendering it more maneuverable while its small size will be a test of its economical design.
Two rovers: SLIM will deploy two small rovers called Lunar Excursion Vehicle (LEV) 1 and 2.
LEV-1, LEV-2, and SLIM will together study the lunar surface near the landing point, collect temperature and radiation readings, and attempt to study the moon’s mantle.

How will SLIM affect Chandrayaan 4?

The terrain near the moon’s poles is rocky, pocked with several craters, and full of steep slopes. Axiomatically, if there is a suitable landing spot for a (relatively) large landing module or rover, its downrange and cross-range limits will be lower than they were for Chandrayaan 3. The craft will have to land as close to the site as possible, if not at the site itself.