Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 18 February 2023

::NATIONAL::

Vibrant Villages Programme

• The Union Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister, has approved Centrally Sponsored Scheme- Vibrant Villages Programme (VVP) for the Financial Years 2022-23 to 2025-26 with financial allocation of Rs. 4800 Crore. 

About:

• VVP, a Centrally Sponsored Scheme, will provide funds for development of essential infrastructure and creation of livelihood opportunities along the northern land border.
• VVP (approved for 2022-23 to 2025-26) will cover Himachal Pradesh(HP), Uttarakhand, Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim and Ladakh.
• Scheme will help in improving quality of life of people andreversing outmigration adding to improved security of border.

Key Features of the Scheme:

• Vibrant Village Action Plans will be created by districtadministration with the help of Gram Panchayats.
• Development of growth centres on Hub and Spoke Model through promotion of social entrepreneurship, youth and womenempowerment etc.
• Out of financial allocation of Rs. 4800 Crore, 2500 crore rupees will be used for roads.
• 100 % saturation of Central and state schemes will be ensured.
• No overlap with Border Area Development Programme (BADP).
• BADP aims to meet development needs of people living in remote and inaccessible areas situated near international border.

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Marine Spatial Planning framework

• Puducherry has launched the country’s first Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) framework as part of a pact under the Indo-Norway Integrated Ocean Initiative.
• The beta version of the MSP for the Union Territory was put together in a collaborative exercise involving the Norwegian Environment Agency, the Ministry of Earth Sciences, the National Centre for Coastal Research (NCCR) etc.

About:

• MSP Framework, part of apact under Indo-NorwayIntegrated Ocean Initiative,was launched to balancegrowth alongsidesustainable management ofocean resources and coastalenvironment preservation.
• Framework is acollaboration betweenNorwegian Environment Agency, Ministry of Earth Sciences, NationalCentre for Coastal Research and UT of Puducherry.
• MSP is a process of analysing and allocating spatial and temporal distributionof human activities in marine areas to achieve ecological, economic, and socialobjectives.
• Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO help countriesby providing a step-by-step guide for ecosystem-based MSP.

Benefits of MSP

• Ecological/Environmental benefits: Identification of biological andecological important areas, reduction of cumulative effects of human activitieson marine ecosystems etc.
• Economics benefits: Certainty of access to desirable areas for new privatesector investments, transparency in permit and licensing procedures etc.
• Social benefits: Improved opportunities for community participation,improved protection of cultural heritage etc.

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::INTERNATIONAL::

Geomagnetic storm

• Recently a Geomagnetic Storm was sparked by solar wind which passed through a gap created in Earth’s magnetic field.

About:

• A geomagnetic storm is a major disturbance of Earth’s magnetosphere.
• These storms result from variations in the solar wind that produces significant changes in the currents, plasmas, and fields in Earth’s magnetosphere.
• The solar wind conditions that are effective for creating geomagnetic storms are sustained (for several hours) periods of the high-speed solar wind and a southward-directed solar wind magnetic field (opposite the direction of Earth’s field) at the dayside of the magnetosphere.
• The largest such storms are associated with solar coronal mass ejections (CMEs), where a billion tons or so of plasma from the sun, with its embedded magnetic field, arrives at Earth. 
• While the storms create a beautiful aurora, they also can disrupt navigation systems such as the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) and create harmful geomagnetic induced currents (GICs) in the power grid and pipelines.

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Aerosols Pollution 

• A recent study has shown higher abundance of sulphate aerosols in the preindustrial atmosphere.

About:

• Aerosols are minute particles suspended in the atmosphere. When these particles arelarge, they scatter and absorb sunlight.
• Their scattering of sunlight can reduce visibility (haze) and redden sunrises and sunset.
• Aerosols interact both directly and indirectly with Earth’s radiation budget and climate.
• Three types of aerosols significantly affect the Earth’s climate:

1.    Volcanic aerosol (forms in stratosphere after major volcanic eruptions).
2.    Desert Dust
3.    Human-made aerosols
Key highlights: 

• The findings suggest that we are likely underestimating sulphate emissions from inactive or non-eruptive volcanoes, probably leading to inaccuracies in future climate projections, the study published in Geophysical Research Letters noted.
• Sulphate emissions can be traced back to natural sources such as volcanoes and industrial processes, including oil combustion, traffic emissions and coal burning.
• Sulphur dioxide, released from natural as well as anthropogenic sources, reacts with water vapour and other gases in the atmosphere to create sulphate aerosols. 
• A higher abundance of sulphate aerosols in the preindustrial atmosphere means anthropogenic sulphate has a relatively small cooling effect.
• But if the preindustrial aerosol is minuscule, she added, anthropogenic sulphate has a large cooling effect.

::Economy::

New Fund Offer

• After the Budget, fund houses have started a number of equity new fund offers (NFO) to boost market share and draw investors. 

About:

• A new fund offer (NFO) refers to the initial sale of fund shares issued by an investment company to investors.
• Similar to an IPO in the stock market, NFOs are intended to raise capital for the fund and attract investors.
• Even though NFOs are marketed, they are done less aggressively so than IPOs, and target certain select groups of investors. As a result, new fund issues may be less noticeable to individual investors than IPOs.
• Investors should check an NFO’s expense ratio and the performance of previous funds offered by the investment company before deciding to invest in an NFO.
• Investors looking to research new fund launches can monitor the press releases of various investment companies as well as news outlets dedicated to aggregating the latest fund news.

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::SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY::

FINDERs

• NASA-developed technology that can remotely detect the tiniest motions of the body caused by basic processes necessary for life will be used by disaster relief teams in earthquake-stricken Turkey. 

About:

• The devices, called FINDERs, for Finding Individuals for Disaster Emergency Response, use microwave radar sensors to find survivors underneath rubble or in avalanches by remotely detecting their heartbeat and respiration. 
• It was designed to detect a human heartbeat buried beneath 30 feet of rubble.
• The radar illuminates the rubble pile and receives reflections back from a disaster site, including the victim.
• FINDER looks for changes in the reflection that indicate movement and then checks to see if those movements can be attributed to human heartbeats and respirations.
• It can distinguish human respiration from animals or mechanical movements.

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