• Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs has approved the proposal for amendment of policy of exemption for Wheat Flour from export ban.
• The approval will now allow to put a restriction on the export of Wheat Flour which will ensure a curb on rising prices of wheat flour and ensure food security of the most vulnerable sections of the society.
• Russia and Ukraine are the major exporters of wheat accounting for around 1/4th of the global wheat trade.
• The conflict between them led to the global wheat supply chain disruptions increasing demand of Indian wheat.
• As a result, the price of wheat in domestic market showed an increase. In order to ensure food security of 1.4 billion people of the country, decision was taken to put a prohibition on export of wheat in May this year.
• However, due to prohibition on export of wheat, the demand for wheat flour has increased in foreign markets.
• Its exports from India have registered a growth of 200 percent during April to July this year compared to the corresponding period last year. The increased demand for wheat flour in international market led to significant price rise of wheat flour in the domestic market.

• A protest was held against the management of the Dhaulasidh Power Project of Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam Limited (SJVNL) for ignoring interests of local residents.
• The local Residents are complaining that, the management was preferring outsiders and ignoring locals while providing jobs. There were even anomalies during the process of land acquisition for the project.

About Dhaulasidh Power Project:

• It is a 66 MW power project.
• It is on Beas River.
• Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam Limited (SJVNL) is Executing Agency.
• The project would generate over 500 jobs and provide irrigation facility to over 200 villages of Nadaun subdivision.

• Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur said that the Central Government would provide about Rs 1,600 crore through the World Bank for the Himachal Pradesh Power Sector Development Programme (HPPSDP). With the state equity, the total programme cost would be around Rs 2,000 crore.
• The World Bank funding under the programme is expected to be available by early next year. Both the World Bank and the Department of MPP and Power are working expeditiously towards the finalisation of the programme.
• The duration of the programme will be five years from 2023 to 2028.
• The Chief Minister said that this programme aimed to undertaking holistic power sector reforms to allow improvement in renewable energy integration.
• The key result areas through which this is being targeted are improvement in the utilisation of the state’s power sector resources in renewable, improvement in reliability of the state’s grid at transmission and distribution levels and strengthening institutional capacities of various state’s power utilities/agencies.
• CM said the programme also aimed at installing new capacities in solar generation of about 200 MW, through the HPPCL and HIMURJA.
• It is important for the state to meet its power requirements to allow optimal trading.
• Hence, the programme shall also focus on strengthening the power network within the state; at transmission level (by HPPTCL) and at the distribution level (by HPSEBL) in 13 towns.

• North India emerged as the most-polluted region in the country in summers this year with Delhi-NCR being the hotspot, according to a new analysis by the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE).
• The green think-tank said the average PM2.5 concentration in north India in summers stood at 71 microgram per cubic metre.
• It was 69 microgram per cubic metre in east India, 54 microgram per cubic metre in west India, and 46 microgram per cubic metre in central India, it said.
• Northeast India (35 microgram per cubic metre) and South India (31 microgram per cubic metre) were cleaner compared to other regions, it said.
• In north India, Delhi-NCR was found to be the most-polluted sub-region, with Bhiwadi reporting the highest average PM2.5 concentration of 134 microgram per cubic metre.
• Manesar reported average PM2.5 concentration of 119 microgram per cubic metre, Ghaziabad (101 microgram per cubic metre), Delhi (97 microgram per cubic metre), Gurugram (94 microgram per cubic metre) and Noida (80 microgram per cubic metre), it said.
• 5 summer average of Delhi-NCR region is almost three times the average of the cities in southern India.
• The CSE used granular real-time data from the Central Pollution Control Board’s portal—Central Control Room for Air Quality Management for the analysis.
• The data is captured from 356 official stations under the Continuous Ambient Air Quality Monitoring System (CAAQMS) spread across 174 cities in 26 states and Union territories.

• Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying has invited applications for National Gopal Ratna Awards – 2022 online through the National Award portal.
• The awards will be conferred on the occasion of National Milk Day, 26th November.
• The Rashtriya Gokul Mission (RGM) was launched in December 2014 for the first time in the country, with a view to conserve and develops indigenous bovine breeds in a scientific manner.

National Gopal Ratna Award during 2022 to be given in the following categories:

• Best Dairy farmer rearing indigenous cattle/buffalo breeds (list of registered breeds annexed).
• Best Artificial Insemination Technician (AIT).
• Best Dairy Cooperative Society/ Milk producer Company/ Dairy Farmer Producer Organisation.

The National Gopal Ratna Award consists of a Certificate of merit, a memento, and amount in each category as under:

• 5,00,000/-(Rupee five lakh only) -1st rank
• 3,00,000/- (Rupee three lakh only) -2nd rank and
• 2,00,000/- (Rupee two lakh only) -3rd rank

• Union Minister of Information and Broadcasting Anurag Singh Thakur launched ‘Azadi Quest’, a series of online educational mobile games developed in collaboration with Zynga India
• Azadi Quest is a set of online games designed for players of all ages for interactive learning with fun gameplay.
• The Initiative is inspired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s call to ‘Engage, Entertain and Educate’ the people through toys and games. On the occasion, Publications Division and Zynga India have signed an MoU to mark year-long partnership to commemorate ‘Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav’ through series of mobile games.
• Zynga is a global leader in interactive entertainment and it is headquartered in California
• Mr Thakur said, gaming sector has grown by 28 per cent in 2021. He said, the number of online gamers has increased to 40 crores last year and expected to touch 45 crores by 2023.
• The first game in the series is Azadi Quest: Match 3 Puzzle, a simple and easy-to-play casual game presenting the players with the colorful journey of India’s independence from 1857 to 1947.
• As players progress through the gameplay, spread across 495 levels they can collect 75 trivia cards, each showcasing key moments in history. While Azadi Quest- Heroes of Bharat is about the heroes of India’s independence.
• Launched in English and Hindi, for android and iOS devices in India, the games will be available globally in September 2022.

• India’s first situational awareness observatory to monitor space activity is going to be set up in Uttarakhand by
• Digantara (which means space in Sanskrit) is a Bengaluru-based firm.

About Observatory 

• The space situational awareness (SSA) observatory will assist in tracking any activity in space including that of space debris and military satellites hovering over the region.
• It aims to track objects as small as 10 cm in size orbiting the earth.
• Significance: It will fill the crucial gap in SSA observations in the region as there is a lack of such facilities between Australia and southern Africa“.
  • The observatory will help to monitor events occurring in deep space, especially in the geostationary, medium-Earth, and high-Earth orbits.
  • The observatory will give India indigenous capabilities to monitor space activity over the subcontinent providing a strategic advantage.
• Global Scenario: At present, the United States is a dominant player in monitoring space debris. It has observatories in multiple locations with commercial companies providing additional inputs from across the world.

• The Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) and the Government of India (GoI) signed a headquarters agreement in New Delhi.
• The agreement will enable the status of an ‘Independent and International Legal Entity’ for CDRI.
• The agreement was signed by Amit Prothi, Director General, CDRI and Noor Rahman Sheikh, Joint Secretary, Ministry of External Affairs, and will enable the institution to pursue functions internationally with all rights, immunities, and privileges, as per the United Nations (Privileges & Immunities) Act, 1947.

About

• The Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) is a partnership of national governments, UN agencies and programmes, multilateral development banks and financing mechanisms, the private sector, and knowledge institutions that aims to promote the resilience of new and existing infrastructure systems to climate and disaster risks in support of sustainable development.
• CDRI promotes rapid development of resilient infrastructure to respond to the Sustainable Development Goals’ imperatives of expanding universal access to basic services, enabling prosperity and decent work.

The following are CDRI’s strategic priorities: 

• Technical Support and Capacity-building: This includes disaster response and recovery support; innovation, institutional and community capacity-building assistance; and standards and certification.
• Research and Knowledge Management: This includes collaborative research; global flagship reports; and a global database of infrastructure and sector resilience.
• Advocacy and Partnerships: This includes global events and initiatives; marketplace of knowledge financing and implementation agencies; and dissemination of knowledge products.

• Minister of Steel Jyotiraditya Scindia will inaugurate the 13th edition of International Conference and Exhibition by the Indian Institute of Metals at Pragati Maidan in New Delhi 26th August 2022.
• According to the Ministry of Steel that the conference aims at identifying long-term measures to promote circular economy to minimize dependency on extraction of natural virgin ore and prepare recommendations and approaches for the metal industry to evolve environmentally friendly, cost-effective, energy-efficient strategies, policies, and practices.
• The theme of this year’s conference is “Resource Efficiency and Circular Economy in Mineral and Metal Sectors.”

What is the circular economy?

• The circular economy is a model of production and consumption, which involves sharing, leasing, reusing, repairing, refurbishing and recycling existing materials and products as long as possible. In this way, the life cycle of products is extended.
• In practice, it implies reducing waste to a minimum. When a product reaches the end of its life, its materials are kept within the economy wherever possible. These can be productively used again and again, thereby creating further value.
• This is a departure from the traditional, linear economic model, which is based on a take-make-consume-throw away pattern. This model relies on large quantities of cheap, easily accessible materials and energy.

• Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment signed a Memorandum of Understanding with National Health Authority for providing comprehensive medical package to transgender people.
• Social Justice and Empowerment Minister Dr. Virendra Kumar and Health Minister Manshukh Mandaviya were present during the MoU signing which was held in Delhi.
• The Social Justice and Empowerment Minister said all health benefits which include general health provisions as well as gender re-affirmation surgery shall be available for transgender persons in the health benefits package under Ayushman Bharat Yojana.
• Under this initiative, each transgender person shall receive a medical cover of 5 lakh rupees per year.
• The Comprehensive package would cover all aspects of transition-related healthcare for Transgender persons.
• It shall also provide coverage of hormone therapy, and gender reaffirmation surgery.

Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Bill, 2019

• The Bill defines a transgender person as one whose gender does not match the gender assigned at birth. It includes transmen and trans-women, persons with intersex variations, gender-queers, and persons with socio-cultural identities, such as kinnar and hijra.
• A transgender person may make an application to the District Magistrate for a certificate of identity, indicating the gender as ‘transgender’.
• It calls for establishing a National Council for Transgender persons (NCT).
• The Bill prohibits discrimination against a transgender person, including denial of service or unfair treatment in relation to Education, Employment, Healthcare, Movement, Reside, Rent, public or private office, and access a Govt or private establishment.
• The Act has a provision that provides transgender with the right of residence with parents and immediate family members.
• It states the offences against Transgender persons will attract jail of 6 months to 2 years and
• Bill also seeks to provide rights of health facilities to transgender persons including separate HIV surveillance centres, and sex reassignment surgeries. Govt shall review the medical curriculum and provide medical insurance.