PIB ANALYSIS FOR UPSC CIVIL SERVICES EXAM
TOPICS COVERED
- Blue Revolution
- Protected / Restricted area permit
- Commission for Sub categorization of OBC
- Allied and Healthcare Professions Bill, 2018
- MoU between Atal Innovation Mission, India and Fund “Talent and Success”, Russia for promotion of science & technology
- Atmosphere & Climate Research-Modelling Observing Systems & Services
1 . Blue Revolution
Blue Revolution aims at doubling the income of farmers. In the last four & half years, Rs 1915.33 crore has been released for its implementation
Fisheries and Aquaculture Infrastructure Development Fund (FIDF) will create employment opportunities for over 9.40 lakh fishermen and entrepreneurs in fishing and allied activities
What is Blue Revolution
- Blue Revolution, the Neel Kranti Mission has the vision to achieve economic prosperity of the country and the fishers and fish farmers as well as contribute towards food and nutritional security through full potential utilization of water resources for fisheries development in a sustainable manner, keeping in view the bio-security and environmental concerns.
Vision
- Creating an enabling environment for integrated development of the full potential of fisheries of the country, alongwith substantially improvement in the income status of fishers and fish farmers keeping in view the sustainability, bio-security and environmental concerns.
Objectives
- To fully tap the total fish potential of the country both in the inland and the marine sector and triple the production by 2020.
- To transform the fisheries sector as a modern industry with special focus on new technologies and processes
- To double the income of the fishers and fish farmers with special focus on increasing productivity and better marketing postharvest infrastructure including e-commerce and other technologies and global best innovations
- To ensure inclusive participation of the fishers and fish farmers in the income enhancement
- To triple the export earnings by 2020 with focus on benefits flow to the fishers and fish farmers including through institutional mechanisms in the cooperative, producer companies and other structures
- To enhance food and nutritional security of the country
Components
The Blue Revolution scheme has the following components:
- National Fisheries Development Board (NFDB) and its activities
- Development of Inland Fisheries and Aquaculture
- Development of Marine Fisheries, Infrastructure and Post-Harvest Operations
- Strengthening of Database & Geographical Information System of the Fisheries Sector
- Institutional Arrangement for Fisheries Sector
- Monitoring, Control and Surveillance (MCS) and other need-based Interventions
- National Scheme of Welfare of Fishermen
2 . Protected / Restricted Area Permit
NCST expresses serious concern over incident involving Us National in A&N Islands
Seeks Immediate Report from MHA and A&N administration
About Protected Area Permit
- The Foreigner ( Protected Areas) Act requires foreigners to obtain a protected areas permit to visit certain areas in India
- Even Indian citizens who are residents also need Inner line permit to visit these areas. NRI’s, PIO card holders and OCI card holders are not eligible, they will have to apply for PAP or RAP
Reasons for Restrictions
- Restrictions for protected / restricted areas are due to security reasons and to protect from outside influence the culture of native people living there
Protected Areas
- Whole of Arunachal Pradesh
- Parts of Himachal Pradesh
- Parts of Jammu & Kashmir
- Whole of Manipur
- Whole of Mizoram
- Whole of Nagaland
- Parts of Rajasthan
- Whole of Sikkim (partly in Protected Area and partly in Restricted Area)
- Parts of Uttarakhand
Restricted Area Permit
- Restricted Area Permit (RAP) is required for non-Indians to visit certain areas in India.
- Unlike PAP, RAP are generally available for individual travellers and can be issued by overseas embassies or even, in some cases such as Port Blair’s Vir Savarkar Airport, on the spot.
- Indian citizens do not need special permission to visit Restricted Areas.
Areas
- RAP are required for all visits to the Union Territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and parts of the state of Sikkim.
3 . Commission for sub categorization of OBC
Cabinet approves extension of the term of the Commission to examine the issue of Sub-categorization of Other Backward Classes in the Central List till 31st May 2019
About the Commission
- The President in exercise of the powers conferred by article 340 of the Constitution appointed a Commission in 2017 to examine the sub-categorisation of Other Backward Classes.
- Sub categorization of the OBCs will ensure that the more backward among the OBC communities can also access the benefits of reservation for educational institutions and government jobs.
- The Commission is headed by Justice (Retd.) G. Rohini
- The Commission was required to present their Report to the President within a period of twelve weeks of assumption of charge by the Chairperson of the Commission but the term now has extended for the fourth time
Terms of Reference
- To examine the extent of inequitable distribution of benefits of reservation among the castes or communities included in the broad category of Other Backward Classes with reference to such classes included in the Central List
- To work out the mechanism, criteria, norms and parameters in a scientific approach for sub-categorisation within such Other Backward Classes
- To take up the exercise of identifying the respective castes or communities or sub-castes or synonyms in the Central List of Other Backward Classes and classifying them into their respective sub-categories
4 . Allied and Healthcare Professions Bill, 2018
Background:
- In the current state of healthcare system, there exist many allied and healthcare professionals, who remain unidentified, unregulated and under utilised.
- Our system is highly focused on efforts towards strengthening limited categories of professionals such as doctors, nurses and frontline workers (like Accredited Social Health Activist or ASHAs, Auxiliary Nurse Midwife or ANMs).
- However, numerous others have been identified over the years, whose potential can be utilised to improve and increase the access to quality driven services in the rural and hard to reach areas.
- Allied and Healthcare Professionals (A&HPs) constitute an important element of the health human resource network, and the skilled and efficient Allied and Healthcare Professionals (A&HPs) can reduce the cost of care and dramatically improve the accessibility to quality driven healthcare services.
- Majority of the countries worldwide, have a statutory licensing or regulatory body that is authorised to license and certify the qualifications and competence of such professionals, particularly those involved in direct patient care (such as physiotherapist, nutritionist etc.) or those whose occupation impact patient care directly (such as lab technologists, dosimetrists etc.).
- Though such professionals have existed in the Indian healthcare system for many decades, a considerable gap in the allied and healthcare space is because of a lack of a comprehensive regulatory framework and absence of standards for education and training of A&HPs.
- The Bill thus seeks to establish a robust regulatory framework which will play the role of a standard-setter and regulator for Allied and Healthcare professions
Details
- Establishment of a Central and corresponding State Allied and Healthcare Councils; 15 major professional categories including 53 professions in Allied and Healthcare streams.
- The Bill provides for Structure, Constitution, Composition and Functions of the Central Council and State Councils, e.g. Framing policies and standards, Regulation of professional conduct, Creation and maintenance of live Registers, provisions for common entry and exit examinations, etc.
- The Central Council will comprise 47 members, of which 14 members shall be ex-officio representing diverse and related roles and functions and remaining 33 shall be non-ex-officio members who mainly represent the 15 professional categories.
- The State Councils are also envisioned to mirror the Central Council,comprising 7 ex-officio and 21 non-ex officio members and Chairperson to be elected from amongst the non-ex officio members.
- Professional Advisory Bodies under Central and State Councils will examine issues independently and provide recommendations relating to specific recognised categories.
- The Bill will also have an overriding effect on any other existing law for any of the covered professions.
- The State Council will undertake recognition of allied and healthcare institutions.
- Offences and Penalties clause have been included in the Bill to check malÂpractices.
- The Bill also empowers the Central and State Governments to make rules.
- Central Govt. also has the power to issue directions to the Council, to make regulations and to add or amend the schedule.
- The Council at the Centre and the States are to be established as body corporate with a provision to receive funds from various sources.
Major Impact, including employment generation potential
- Bring all existing allied and healthcare professionals on board during thefirst few of years from the date of establishment of the Council.
- Opportunity to create qualified, highly skilled and competent jobs inhealthcare by enabling professionalism of the allied and healthcare workforce.
- High quality, multi-disciplinary care in line with the vision of AyushmanBharat, moving away from a ‘doctor led’ model to a ‘care accessible and team based’ model.
- Opportunity to cater to the global demand (shortage) of healthcareworkforce which is projected to be about 15 million by the year 2030, asper the WHO Global Workforce, 2030 report.
5 . MoU between Atal Innovation Mission, India and Fund “Talent and Success”, Russia for promotion of science & technology
Benefits
- The MoU will facilitate promotion of science & technology, strong foundation to the collaborative work through exchange of students, teachers, researchers and scientists between India and Russia.
Major Impact
- The MOU will provide a mechanism in taking part in establishing relationships with-schools, universities, cultural institutions, science & technology and specialized education institutions, high-tech companies, startups and innovation centers in both countries.
- The activities are expected to promote creation of new scientific knowledge, generation of intellectual property, innovations and products development in both countries.
6 . Atmosphere & Climate Research-Modelling Observing Systems & Services
Impact
- The scheme will provide improved weather, climate and ocean forecast and services, thereby ensuring transfer of commensurate benefits to the various services like Public weather service, disaster management, Agro-meteorological Services, Aviation services, Environmental monitoring services, Hydro-meteorological services, climate services, tourism, pilgrimage, power generation, water management, Sports & adventure etc.
Generating employment opportunities
- A sizable number of scientific and technical staff along with requisite administrative support, thereby generating employment.
- To ensure last-mile connectivity of the weather based services to the end -user, a large number of agencies like the Krishi Vigyana Kendras of Indian Council of Agricultural Research, Universities and local municipalities are roped in thus generating employment opportunities to many people.
Details
- ACROSS scheme pertains to the atmospheric science programs of the Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) and addresses different aspects of weather and climate services, which includes warnings for cyclone, storm surges, heat waves, thunderstorms etc.
- Each of these aspects is incorporated as nine sub-schemes under the umbrella scheme “ACROSS” and is implemented in an integrated manner through the aforesaid four institutes.
- The ACROSS scheme consists of nine sub-programmes which are multi disciplinary and multi institutional in nature and will be implemented in an integrated manner through IMD, HIM, NCMRWF and INCOIS.
- As the objective of the ACROSS scheme is to provide a reliable weather and climate forecast for betterment of society, the scheme will aim at improving skill of weather and climate forecast through sustained observations, intensive R & D, and by adopting effective dissemination and communication strategies to ensure its timely reach to the end-user of all services like Agro-meteorological Services, Aviation service, Environmental monitoring services, Hydro-meteorological services, climate services, tourism, pilgrimage, mountaineering etc.