Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 08 August 2013

Conservation talks on Antarctica’s living marine resources fail

• The commission for conservation of Antarctic marine living resources (CCAMLR) in an extraordinary meeting held at Bremerhaven, recently, failed to reach any concrete agreement on the two proposals put forward for creation of marine protected areas (MPAs) in the Antarctic. CCAMLR’s members are drawn from 24 countries and the European Union.

• The meeting was a follow up to last year’s CCAMLR meeting in Hobart, Australia, which also concluded without any consensus on marine protected areas for the Antarctic.
• The US and New Zealand proposal calls for CCAMLR to designate a Ross Sea MPA of 2.3 million square kilometres including a ‘fully protected’ area of 1.6 million square kilometres.
• The second proposal from Australia, France and the European Union would designate seven marine protected areas in East Antarctica covering about 1.63 million square kilometres.
• At Bemerhaven, this year, the proposals would have been carried forward to implementation, had not one member Nation — Russia — voted against them and scuttled the whole process.

Sun’s magnetic ‘flip’ may affect our climate

• In the next three to four months, the Sun’s magnetic field is expected to undergo a 180-degree “flip” that will see its magnetic north and south poles reverse positions.
• The warning comes from NASA, which has been monitoring solar activity, and the U.S. space agency has cautioned that it could affect storms on Earth and even disrupt satellites.
• The outer layers of the Sun consist of a soup of charged particles whose constant motion influences the alignment of the Sun’s magnetic field. There are two “winds” of such charged particles, one moving east-west and the other, north-south.

• These tug at each other to move the magnetic north and south poles of the Sun, making them go a full-circle once every 22 years. This period is called a solar cycle, understood as a reorientation of the solar dynamo which is the source of the Sun’s magnetic field.

Sustainable development

• The Millennium Development Goals (MDG), set in 2000, promised a world with dramatically less poverty, hunger, oppression, and environmental damage by 2015.
• Meanwhile, the Rio+20 Conference on Sustainable Development has also taken place in 2012 and there is a strong demand for ecological sustainability to be a fulcrum of the post-2015 agenda.

A new Route for Myanmar

• The 25th anniversary of Myanmar’s historic 8888 Movement is being celebrated in Yangon from August 6 to 8. The event has been organised by leaders of the students’ group now known as the 88 Generation, with donations from the public.

• The event is a commemoration as well as a celebration.
• It is a commemoration for the fallen heroes of the 1988 student-led uprising against General Ne Win’s rule.
• It is a celebration because this is the first time the government has allowed such a commemoration to be held, a testament to the gradual democratic reforms in the country.

• In previous years, it was impossible to organise the event in Myanmar. Even just saying ‘88’ could land you behind bars. It could only be celebrated outside the country, by people in exile and Myanmarese expatriates.

FSDC to set up forum for inter-agency coordination

• The Sub-Committee of the Financial Stability and Development Council (FSDC) decided to set up a forum for inter-agency coordination and exchange of information about collective investment schemes (CIS) and discussed the need for a nationwide awareness campaign in this respect.
• FSDC reviewed the potential risks to stability of the domestic financial system, including deteriorating asset quality of public sector banks.

• “The Sub-Committee expressed concern on the deteriorating asset quality of public sector banks and discussed corrective measures in this regard,” said the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in a release here.

• Proposals in respect of banks selling insurance products for more than one insurance company under the bancassurance model were discussed, said the RBI.

• The Sub-Committee also discussed the potential impact on India of the extra-territorial aspects of regulations by European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) and U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and decided to chalk out a unified strategy for the same.

• The Sub-Committee also reviewed the functioning of its technical groups set up for focussed attention on different areas/segments on financial Inclusion, financial literacy and the inter-regulatory coordination.

Sources: Various News Papers