WHY IN THE NEWS?

• Apple’s co-creator Steve Wozniak has launched a new space start-up called Privateer Space, bringing potential competition to a field dominated by billionaires Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson.
• Privateer will be represented at the Advanced Maui Optical and Space Surveillance Technologies Conference, scheduled to run from September 14-17 in Hawaii.
• The global space economy, which has attracted many top companies such as Tesla and Amazon, involves various activities such as research and development, space tourism and the utilisation of space.
• Bank of America predicts the space economy will have more than tripled in size by 2030, with a $1.4 trillion market value.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• Indian Army will organize “Bijoya Sanskritik Mahotsav” from 26 to 29 September in Kolkata. This Mahotsav will be observed to mark the golden jubilee of the India-Pak war 1971.
• The event will be inaugurated by Lieutenant General Manoj Pande, Army Commander, Eastern Command. Various cultural programs including film screening, theatre plays, musical concerts, and band performances will be conducted during this event. It will be organized as part of the Swarnim Vijay Varsha celebrations to commemorate the golden jubilee of the India-Pak war.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced its annual Goalkeepers ‘Global Goals Awards’ 2021, as part of its annual Goalkeepers campaign. Goalkeepers are the foundation’s campaign to accelerate progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (Global Goals).
• The 2021 Global Goalkeeper Award: Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, former United Nations under-secretary-general and executive director of UN Women.
• The 2021 Progress Award: Jenifer Colpas from Colombia, for her work which centres around improving access to clean water and sanitation.
• The 2021 Campaign Award: Satta Sheriff of Liberia, for her work promoting gender equality.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• The government has set up an asset management company (AMC) named India Debt Resolution Company Ltd (IDRCL) with a paid-up capital of Rs. 80.5 lakh on an authorized capital of Rs 50 crore.
• IDRCL will work in tandem with the National Asset Reconstruction Company Ltd (NARCL) to clean up bad loans.
• Bank of Baroda (BoB), Punjab National Bank (PNB), Bank of India (BoI), Bank of Maharashtra, SBI, Union Bank of India, Canara Bank, Indian Bank and IDBI Bank are the shareholders of IDRCL.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• The Union education ministry has formed a 12-member committee to develop new curriculums for school, early childhood, teacher and adult education.
• The panel tasked with developing four national curriculum frameworks (NCFs) will be headed by National Education Policy-2020 (NEP-2020) drafting committee chairperson K Kasturirangan.
• The committee will discuss “position papers” finalised by national focus groups on different aspects of the four areas drawing inputs from state curriculum frameworks. The NCFs serve as a guideline for syllabus, textbook and teaching practices for schools in India.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• The government of India has hosted the first India-United Kingdom Consular Dialogue in the virtual medium.
• Joint Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs, Devesh Uttam led the Indian delegation while the UK delegation was led by Jennifer Anderson. Both sides discussed the ways to strengthen people-to-people contacts as part of the India-UK 2030 roadmap.
• At this inaugural Consular Dialogue, the two sides discussed ways to further strengthen people-to-people contacts between the two countries as part of the India-UK 2030 roadmap.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• Rajiv Bansal was appointed as Secretary in the Ministry of Civil Aviation. Bansal is currently Chairman & Managing Director (CMD) of Air India. He is a 1988-batch IAS Nagaland cadre, Bansal was serving as additional secretary in the Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas before Air India.
• He will replace the current Aviation Secretary Pradeep Singh Kharola, who retires on 30 September. Last year in February, Bansal was appointed as the chairman and managing director of Air India for a second time.
• His appointment came just days after the government announced 100% stake sale of the debt-ridden Air India.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission on September 27, 2021.

About:

• Under this mission, a unique digital health ID will be provided to the people. This ID will contain all the health records of the person.
• This mission was launched under the pilot project National Digital Health Mission.
• The nationwide rollout of the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission coincides with the third anniversary of Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB PM-JAY). The third anniversary is being marked by the National Health Authority (NHA).

Background

Prime Minister had announced the pilot project of National Digital Health Mission from the Red Fort on August 15, 2020.

About Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission

• Presently, this project is being implemented in the pilot phase across six Union Territories.
• This mission will also enable the access and exchange of longitudinal health records people with their consent.
• Key components of this project include:

1. A Health ID for every citizen. It will also work as their health account. Through this ID, personal health records can be linked and viewed using a mobile application.
2. Healthcare Professionals Registry (HPR) and
3. Healthcare Facilities Registries (HFR) – It will act as a repository of all healthcare providers in modern as well as traditional systems of medicine.

Significance of the scheme

This mission will also ensure ease of doing business for doctors & hospitals and healthcare service providers. It will also create interoperability within the digital health ecosystem, on the line of role played by the Unified Payments Interface in revolutionising payments

WHY IN THE NEWS?

World Tourism Day is observed by the United Nations Organisations (UNO) on September 27, every year.

About:

The theme of the day

In the year 2021, world tourism day was observed under the theme– ‘Tourism for Inclusive Growth’. This theme was designated by World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) considering the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic had a massive social and economic impact on the developed as well as the developing economies. So, the organisation believes that, tourism will help in the recovery and growth of the economies.

Significance of tourism sector

As per official website of United Nations Organisations (UNO), tourism is the most important economic sectors that employs and provide livelihood to one in every tenth person on Earth. In several countries, tourism represent more than 20 per cent of their GDP. The constant growth of the tourism sector in the last six decades reflects more progressive access towards tourism because of declining cost of transport and growth of middle classes worldwide.

Background

UNWTO had instituted the World Tourism Day during a meeting that took place in Spain. This meeting commenced first celebration of the day in the year 1980. September 27 was chosen as the date to coincide with the 10th anniversary of the adoption of the UNWTO Statutes. UNWTO statutes were adopted on September 27, 1970.

Tourism amid covid-19

As per UNO, biggest crisis in the history of tourism was witnessed during 2020-2021. The international tourist arrivals were 85 per cent lesser as compared to tourism is 2019. It witnessed a drop of 65 per cent in 2020, in between January and May. However, despite a small revival in May 2021, emergence of new COVID-19 variants & continued restrictions are slowing the recovery of international travel. Though, domestic tourism has rebounded in many parts of the globe.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

Union Minister for Commerce, Industry and Textiles Piyush Goyal announced to set up a “Weaver Services and Design Resource Center” in Kullu district of Himachal Pradesh.

About:

• This centre will help in encouraging the attractive handicraft products of the state and provide a better platform to export these products at the international market.
• The Minister announced this while addressing at an interaction programme with handicrafts and handloom artisans.
• Programme was organized under ‘Seva & Samarpan Abhiyan’ to commemorate the golden jubilee year of statehood of Himachal Pradesh on September 27, 2021.

Weaving in Himachal Pradesh

Himachal Pradesh has the tremendous talent and potential with magical hands that weaves beautiful art products. Thus, there is a need to work proactively by State & Central Ministries in order to bring these products into the international market to get more befits. More attention should be paid on modernizing the design, packaging, quality and marketing in order to provide weavers a better price for their products at international market.

District-wise exhibitions

The union minister also suggested to organize district-wise exhibitions of products from the state in big cities, in five star hotels and people associated with the textile industry so that branding could be done for these products at national and international level. He also asked the weavers to get their trademark for which central government reduced the registration fee by 80 percent. He also urged the State Industries Department to focus on ways and means of improving the quality of wool used in manufacturing of handloom and handicraft products. According to the minister, there is a paramount need of focusing on standardized packaging.