Tejas - Light Combat Aircraft (LCA)
- The naval variant of the LCA Tejas has made a first successful “Arrested landing” test.
- Arrested landing means to rapidly decelerate an aircraft as it lands.
- In about 2 seconds, Tejas decelerated from 244 km/hr to standstill by, snagging the wire on the test runway with the hook attached to the jet's fuselage (body).
- The Tejas will need to replicate this, out at sea when it attempts to land on the deck of India's only operational aircraft carrier, INS Vikramaditya.
- An "arrested landing" on the deck of an aircraft carrier is a feat achieved only by a handful of fighter jets developed in the US, Russia, UK, France and China.
- The aircraft has to land on a 100-metre runaway on an aircraft carrier (a normal LCA lands on a one-kilometre runway).
New Delhi Declaration
- The declaration was adopted by the participating countries at the 14th CoP to the UNCCD.
- It comes with an action plan to save the planet from losing more land and to achieve SDG target of land degradation neutrality by 2030.
- The parties expressed support for new initiatives to improve human health, well-being and to advance peace and security.
- The declaration also stated that,
- World needs to consider land-based solutions for climate action and
- Biodiversity conservation to achieve the long-term goals of the Paris Agreement.
- It also special emphasis on,
- Community-driven transformative projects,
- That are gender-sensitive at local, national and regional levels to drive implementation.
Bamboonomics
- Ministry of Tribal Affairs launched the biggest Tribal movement, to promote tribal enterprise through ‘Bamboonomics’.
- It was launched for combating desertification and the climate change at COP 14 to the UNCCD.
- TRIFED introduced the ‘The 4P1000 Initiative: The Tribal Perspective through Bamboonomics’.
- The international initiative "4 per 1000" was launched by France in 2015 at the COP 21.
- The aim of the initiative is to,
- Demonstrate that agriculture, and in particular agricultural soils can play a crucial role where food security and climate change are concerned.
- The ambition of the initiative is to,
- Encourage stakeholders to transition towards a productive, highly resilient agriculture,
- based on the appropriate management of lands and soils,
- creating jobs and incomes hence ensuring sustainable development.
- An annual growth rate of 0.4% in the soil carbon stocks, or 4‰ per year, in the first 30-40 cm of soil,
- would significantly reduce the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere related to human activities.
- This is what the 4 per 1000 Initiative proposes, soils for food security and climate.
- The initiative is intended to complement those necessary efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions globally.
- It is voluntary, it is up to each member to define how they want to contribute to the goals.
Maritime Communication Services in India
- The Ministry of Communications, Electronics & Information Technology has launched maritime communication.
- This will enable high-end support to those in the sea by providing,
- Access to Voice, Data and Video services while travelling on vessels, cruise liners, ships in India.
- It is by using ‘Satellite technology’.
- Tata Group’s ‘Nelco’, India's leading VSAT solutions provider will provide quality broadband services to the maritime sector.
- A web portal was also launched for reporting stolen mobiles to help trace them.
- The major objectives of the project include,
- Blocking of lost/stolen mobile phones across mobile networks,
- Prevention of mobile devices with duplicate and fake IMEIs and
- Curtail the use of counterfeit mobile devices.
Mid-Autumn Festival
- It is a harvest festival that marks the end of the autumn harvest and appearance of the fullest moon of the year.
- It is an important celebration across East Asian and Southeast Asian countries, particularly those having Chinese communities.
- The harvest festivals celebrated in Asia and in other parts of the world that occur within days and weeks of each other,
- Includes common themes of family and gathering, prayers and thanksgiving and gratitude for a good harvest.
- Variations in cultural and religious practices and the names of the festivals depend on the country and region.
- But the overarching theme of the autumnal harvest is the same.
- The diversity of culture in India has resulted in unique versions of harvest festivals for the spring and autumn harvest cycles.
Source: PIB, The Indian Express
