Friday Factly 13 November 2020

General Studies-II

Judicial Reforms:

• More than 40 mn cases are pending in India in various courts.
• According to National Judicial Data Grid more than 80,000 cases are more than 30 years old in district courts.

General Studies-III

MSP

• NSS survey and NITI Aayog study showcase that MSP awareness remains low.
• The regime favors only a small proportion of farmers (6 per cent) and has been largely unavailable to the majority of the small and marginal farmer (94 per cent).
• MSP awareness stands at around 17 per cent and 18 per cent for Rabi and kharif crops, respectively.
  
• According to NSS 70th Round, only 25 per cent of agricultural households sold their produce in the APMC mandis, whereas 65 per cent of households sold to private players.
• For the two main food crops, wheat and rice, the figures remain abysmally low at 16 per cent and 10 per cent respectively. 

Plastic Pollution:

According to a recent WWF Risk Filter analysis, 100 cities globally will be facing ‘severe water scarcity’ by 2050

• The global Marine plastic Pollution footprint is estimated to be 8-10 million tonnes annually—equivalent to dumping one truck of garbage into the ocean every minute
• A rough estimate suggests that close to 150 million tonnes (mt) of plastics have already polluted our oceans, and most of it originates from land (that is, it is not dumped into the ocean directly from vessels etc).
• Plastic packaging accounts for more than 62% of all items (including non-plastics) collected in international coastal clean-up initiatives.
• According to World Economic Forum 32% of all single-use packaging escapes collection systems.

Digital Divide

• More than 400 million people still have no access to the internet.
• Internet density in rural areas, where more than 60% of the people live, is still low at 25% compared to the internet density in urban areas (90%).
• States like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh with very low internet use density.
• Far fewer women with access to mobile phones and internet services.
• India’s digital sectors still account for less than 10% of GDP, which is low compared to other emerging economies.
• E-commerce revenue remains at less than 5% of trade in India, and more than 80% of all retail transactions are still made in cash.

Indian Economy:

• The overall economic cost of air pollution is estimated at around 7% of GDP or 14 lakh crores, which is almost twice the fiscal deficit of our nation.
• The largest component of GDP, PFCE, has not only declined as a share of GDP — 68 per cent in 1990 to 56 per cent of GDP in 2019 — but also in terms of growth rates in recent years.