Daily Current Affairs for UPSC CSE
Topics Covered
- Inflation
- Challenges in achieving herd immunity through vaccination
- States with stressed groundwater top in cereal trade: Study
- Microwave Weapons
- Severe acute malnutrition
- Facts for Prelims
1 . Inflation
Context : The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Reserve Bank of India decided to hold the benchmark repo rate unchanged at 4%. MPC opined that inflation was likely to remain elevated, “barring transient relief in the winter months from prices of perishables”. This, it stressed, “constrains monetary policy at the current juncture from using the space available to act in support of growth”.
What is the projection on CPI inflation?
- The rate-setting panel noted that the recovery appeared to be “far from being broad-based” and was dependent on sustained policy support, which the central bank offered through a raft of measures to ensure that credit availability remains adequate.
- Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation, the RBI said, would average 6.8% for Q3 and 5.8% in Q4 — both levels above or close to the 6% upper bound of the target range for ensuring price stability — before easing to a 5.2% to 4.6% range in the first half of the next financial year, starting April 2021.
How does India measure retail inflation?
- Inflation is the rate of change in the prices of a given set of items. India bases its retail inflation metrics on the Consumer Price Index (CPI).
- The index records changes in prices for a sample of family budget items that are representative of what consumers typically spend their household income on — food, fuel, housing, clothing, health, education, amusement and even paan, tobacco and intoxicants.
- The measure is based on a weighted average. That is, some items in the index may get greater weightage depending on their priority in a typical family’s budget.
- The CPI-based retail inflation is measured monthly and is published as a percentage value of change in the index from the corresponding year-earlier period.
- Data for a certain month are released by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation generally on the twelfth day of the subsequent month.
Why is faster inflation a concern for policymakers?
- Faster retail inflation is indicative of prices of household items rising quickly. While inflation affects everyone, it is often referred to as a ‘tax on the poor’ as the low-income stratum of society bears the brunt.
- Persistent high inflation pushes several items out of reach for this category of consumers. For example, onions and potatoes are generally a key staple in an average Indian family’s diet.
- But, if the price of potatoes starts rising rapidly, a poor household is often forced to sharply reduce or forgo its consumption of this key source of essential nutrients, including carbohydrates.
- Over time, if unchecked, persistent high inflation erodes the value of money and hurts several other segments of the population, including the elderly living off a fixed pension. It hence ends up undermining a society’s consumptive capacity, and thereby, economic growth itself.
What is the RBI’s role in tackling inflation?
- In 2016, the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934, was amended to provide a statutory basis for the implementation of a flexible inflation-targeting framework, where the Centre and the RBI would review and agree upon a specific inflation target every five years.
- Under this, 4% was set as the Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation target for the period from August 5, 2016, to March 31, 2021, with the upper tolerance limit of 6% and the lower tolerance limit of 2%.
- To the extent that ensuring price stability is its primary goal, the RBI through its MPC must constantly assess not just current levels of inflation and prices of various goods and services in the economy, but also take into consideration inflation expectations both of consumers and financial markets so as to use an array of monetary tools, including interest rates, to contain inflation within its target range.
What is core inflation and why is it important?
- Core inflation helps measure inflation after excluding the effects of temporary volatility, especially from prices of items such as fuel and food. For example, seasonal spikes in food prices may skew the inflation rate, but the effect is only transitory.
- The RBI’s action on rates, however, affects the economy with a lag, by which time the spikes in the price of those food items may have reversed. Viewing inflation after stripping out such volatility helps give it a better picture of the underlying trend in prices.
- In Friday’s statement, the MPC noted: “Cost-push pressures continue to impinge on core inflation, which has remained sticky and could firm up as economic activity normalises and demand picks up.”
2 . Challenges in achieving herd immunity through vaccination
Context : Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said that the government has never spoken about vaccinating the entire country against COVID-19. Adding to that, Director-General of ICMR Dr. Balram Bhargava said: “If we’re able to vaccinate a critical mass of people and break virus transmission, then we may not have to vaccinate the entire population.”
Challenges in vaccinating critical mass of people
- Uneven transmission : Levels of immunisation needed for herd immunity are determined by how the virus spreads in the population, and makes the assumption that spread is homogenous. But SARS-CoV-2 virus spread exhibits a high level of uneven transmission. Considering that two doses of the vaccine are needed for full protection and increased vaccine hesitancy particularly as the vaccine development and testing are seen to be rushed, achieving herd immunity of 70% to break the chain would be challenging.
- It was only in January this year that India achieved 90% coverage of all vaccines to be given in infancy. If there is a drop in vaccine coverage in children beyond their first year of life in the immunisation programme, it becomes particularly difficult in the case of SARS-CoV-2.
- Design, logistics and implementation challenge : “With COVID-19 vaccines, we will also need to reach age groups which are not currently targeted as part of the large-scale immunisation efforts. This will be a design, logistics and implementation challenge.
- Effectiveness of the vaccine : Clinical trials test the efficacy of the vaccine, while the actual effectiveness of the vaccine will be known only when a large number of people are vaccinated post-licensure. Also, the duration of protection is not known and hence how frequently the vaccine has to be administered remains unknown. It is critically important to understand these to make sure that no resources are diverted from existing immunisation programmes that need to continue
- Ethical challenges : Considering that the government has already listed out the high-priority groups that will receive the vaccine, the issue of choosing other sections of the population that needs to be vaccinated to achieve herd immunity will be ethically challenging.
- Updating the evidence : Another contentious area is the question of vaccinating those who have already been infected. “The immunity offered by the natural infection is probably long term. Till date, we are not aware of the added benefits or risks of vaccinating the people who are already infected. It is time we start doing some quick trials to update the evidence based on the contextual needs
3 . States with stressed groundwater top in cereal trade: Study
Context : A recent study has noted link between cereal production and depleting water tables
Key observations of the study
- According tot the report states with critically low groundwater reserves were responsible for 41%, or about 38.6 million tonnes, of domestic cereal trade. This worked out to nearly 39% of the groundwater being used up in producing and trading cereals among States.
- A further 21% (19.6 Mt) of domestically produced cereals were exported from six States with ‘semicritical’ to ‘critical’ groundwater status equivalent to 32% of groundwater
- Trade patterns varied between PDS and non-PDS cereals. The majority (58%; 58.0 Mt) of inter-State cereal trade occurred through the PDS.
- Previous studies of embedded water flow in agricultural production have usually focussed on international movements — for instance the amount of water that was lost when a country imported a food crop from another, whereas this focussed on domestic movements and incorporates the role of the public distribution system (PDS) as well as international outflows
- Findings reiterate the substantial potential for balancing water resources through the trade of crops in India, either in addition to or in place of large-scale infrastructure projects
Importance of cereals
- Cereals are the source of about half the energy that an average Indian gets from her diet. Within them, rice and wheat dominate cereal production and it’s also known that they are intensely water-consumptive crops.
4 . Microwave Energy
Context : A new report by a National Academy of Sciences committee has found that “directed” microwave radiation is the likely cause of illnesses among American diplomats in Cuba and China.
About the News
- The study commissioned by the State Department is the latest attempt to find a cause for the mysterious illnesses that started to emerge in late 2016 among U.S. personnel in Havana.
- The study found that “directed, pulsed radio frequency energy appears to be the most plausible” explanation for symptoms that included intense head pressure, dizziness and cognitive difficulties. It found this explanation was more likely than other previously considered causes such as tropical disease or psychological issues. The study did not name a source for the energy and did not say it came as the result of an attack, though it did note that previous research on this type of injury was done in the former Soviet Union.
What is Microwave Radiation?
- Microwaves are a form of “electromagnetic” radiation; that is, they are waves of electrical and magnetic energy moving together through space.
- Electromagnetic radiation spans a broad spectrum from very long radio waves to very short gamma rays.
- The human eye can only detect a small portion of this spectrum called visible light. A radio detects a different portion of the spectrum, and an X-ray machine uses yet another portion.
- Visible light, microwaves, and radio frequency (RF) radiation are forms of non-ionizing radiation. Non-ionizing radiation does not have enough energy to knock electrons out of atoms. X-rays are a form of ionizing radiation.
- Exposure to ionizing radiation can alter atoms and molecules and cause damage to cells in organic matter.
- Microwaves are used to detect speeding cars and to send telephone and television communications. Industry uses microwaves to dry and cure plywood, to cure rubber and resins, to raise bread and doughnuts, and to cook potato chips. But the most common consumer use of microwave energy is in microwave ovens. Microwaves have three characteristics that allow them to be used in cooking: they are reflected by metal; they pass through glass, paper, plastic, and similar materials; and they are absorbed by foods.
What are ‘microwave weapons’?
- “Microwave weapons” are supposed to be a type of direct energy weapons, which aim highly focused energy in the form of sonic, laser, or microwaves, at a target.
5 . Severe acute malnutrition
Context : The Madhya Pradesh government is preparing to deal with a likely surge in children suffering from Severe Acute Malnutrition (SAM), by chalking out a strategy to cater to 1 lakh such children by emphasising on community-led efforts in order to overcome shortcomings in health infrastructure
What is severe acute malnutrition?
- Severe acute malnutrition is the most extreme and visible form of undernutrition
- Children with severe acute malnutrition have very low weight for their height and severe muscle wasting. They may also have nutritional oedema – characterized by swollen feet, face and limbs.
- Severe acute malnutrition is a major cause of death in children under 5, and its prevention and treatment are critical to child survival and development.
Current Cases of SAM in Madhya Pradesh
- Going by the prediction models, in the most optimistic scenario the State should be gearing to create supportive mechanisms for over 1 lakh SAM cases as just before the lockdown the number of SAM cases was hovering around 81,000.
Government Strategy
- The government has decided to launch a strategy focused on nutritional care and rehabilitation of vulnerable children on the basis of a pilot project run by UNICEF in a block in Hoshangabad district.
- This would involved identifying children suffering from anemia, low birth weight, deprivation of essential nutrients and micronutrients.
- The scheme is being implemented under a programme titled “Integrated Management of Acute Malnutrition” (IMAM).
- The community management treatment includes identification of vulnerable children, community supervised feeding and monitoring of the health status, and forming mothers’ groups as well as those of adolescent girls to assist frontline workers in spreading awareness within the community.
- Incentives are also planned for various stakeholders such as village and health sanitation committees, SHGs, frontline workers, and families of SAM children.
6 . Facts for Prelims
Rat-hole mining
- Rat-hole mining is a term used for a hazardous and arduous mining technique where miners crawl into winding underground tunnels that are just 4-5 feet in diameter to extract coal from the deep seams with a pickaxe.
Bhasar Char
- Bhasan Char, the site where Bangladesh has begun sending Rohingya refugees from the overcrowded camps at Cox’s Bazar, is an island formed by sedimentation (char is Bengali for sediment) close to the coast.
- Bhasan Char is less an island and more mud flat, and is vulnerable to going under water from tides and flooding. Much of it is submerged during the monsoon. Located near the mouth of the river Meghna where it flows into the Bay of Bengal, Bhasan Char surfaced only in 2006 from the sediment deposited by the river
