Current Affairs on Economy

Current affairs on 28 April 2017

The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), the Innovative Finance Foundation (IFF) and 3WAYSTE company signed an MoU to collaborate on
the rollout of a breakthrough technology for municipal solid waste management.
The technology is capable of treating all household waste into residue fuel to produce clean energy.

Fori Nehru passed away at her home in Kasauli in Himachal Pradesh on 25 April 2017 and was the oldest living member of the Nehru family.
109-year old Fori Nehru's original nationality was Hungariana by birth and was known as Magdolna Friedman before she married Jawaharlal Nehru’s cousin B.K. Nehru in 1935. B.K. Nehru was Indian Ambassador to the United States.
After Partition, Fori joined the Emergency Committee for refugees, and started a massive employment campaign for refugee women in 1947, which later evolved into the Cottage Industries Emporium.

The first-ever flight under Union Government’s ambitious UDAN (“Ude Desh ka Har Nagarik” and it aims to build efficient regional air connectivity across the country) regional connectivity scheme was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 27 April 2017 between Shimla and New Delhi and flight will allow tourists to fly to Shimla from New Delhi for just Rs. 2,000.
The Shimla Airport (at Jubbarhatti) had been shut for scheduled flights since 6 September 2012, affecting tourists and business travellers to the state.
5 airline companies have been chosen for the scheme Airline Allied Services (Alliance Air), SpiceJet, Turbo Megha Airways, Air Deccan and Air Odisha with seating capacity of airlines under the UDAN scheme will range from 19 to 78 and 50% of the seats in every flight will have a fare cap of Rs 2,500 per seat per hour.

The Labour Ministry has proposed a minimum monthly income of Rs.10000 for contract workers which is at present, employers give the fixed minimum wages to workers for 45 economic activities.
The move will drastically increase the minimum wages of contract labourers from around Rs.6000 per month that is paid to them in a few sectors at present.

In order to ease the life by giving more freedom to farmers to sell their produce, the agriculture ministry has unveiled “The State/UT Agricultural
Produce and Livestocks Marketing (promotion and facilitation) Act, 2017” was passed in 2003 is the draft law proposes to cap market fees and commission charges payable by a farmer after bringing produce to a wholesale market.

A gigantic Tunnel Boring Machine is being used to build a underwater tunnel which will connect Howrah with Kolkata with the cost of Rs. 8900 crores and is expect to completed by July.
The two 520-metre structures are part of a 10.8 km underground stretch and are crucial to the East West Metro project.

Posted on: 26th April 2017 Read complete Article →

As per information released by Oil Ministry’s Petroleum Planning & Analysis Cell (PPAC), India has replaced Japan as the world’s second-largest importer of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG).
PPAC’s data has disclosed that India’s import of LPG soared 23% during the financial year that ended 31 March 2017 to 11 million tonnes while that of Japan slipped 3.2% during the same period to 10.6 million tonnes. India thus toppled Japan to become world’s second largest LPG importer. China remains the world’s top importer.
This increase in LPG imports is primarily due to Narendra Modi government’s push to provide cooking gas cylinders to the poor and wean them off polluting fuels.
LPG in India is still primarily used as a cooking fuel while Japan is cutting back on LPG as cooking fuel and is moving to cheaper alternatives such as natural gas.

3rd edition of NITI Aayog’s Governing Council that was held on 23 April 2017 chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has presented a precursor of the ambitious ‘15-year Vision Document’ to accelerate the country’s economic development.
The meeting was attended by Chief Ministers of all states except West Bengal and Delhi in which NITI Aayog’s Vice-Chairman, Arvind Panagariya, presented a roadmap for “rapid transformation” of India by outlining key aspects of the document, comprising a seven-year strategy paper and a three-year action plan.
First meeting of NITI Aayog on the same was held on 8 February 2015, in which the Prime Minister had laid down the key mandates of NITI Aayog such as fostering cooperative federalism by addressing national issues through mutual cooperation and monitoring of important schemes and programs. and in second meeting the was held on 15 July 2015, had reviewed the progress made by the three sub-groups of chief ministers and the two task forces.

Posted on: 25th April 2017 Read complete Article →

Rajasthan government and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL) signed an agreement for the Rs 43,129 crore Barmer refinery in which state government will have 26% stake in the project while rest will be held by HPCL.
The Barmer refinery will be the first in the country to produce BS-6 standard fuel.

Posted on: 24th April 2017 Read complete Article →

World Bank has approved a $375 million loan to India’s first inland water transport fairway National Waterway 1 (NW1) project.
The water project will be built on a 1,360 km stretch of the Ganga river between Varanasi and the seaport of Haldia.

Posted on: 18th April 2017 Read complete Article →