15 Dec 2023

#GS3: 01. World’s Financial System

Our goal is to make a more efficient, interoperable and accessible financial system by providing rules to avoid the risks
of crypto, and infrastructure by leveraging some of its technologies.

-KRISTALINA GEORGIEVA MANAGING DIRECTOR,IMF

#GS2: 02. PLI Schemes

The output of PLI schemes this year(so far) is not as high as we expected, but the performance in terms of sales and exports has been reasonably good. The focus of the government now is to strengthen and support the existing PLI schemes that cover 14 sectors.
– DPIIT secretary Rajesh Kumar Singh

#GS3: 03. Logistics Cost in India

India’s logistics costs ranged between 7.8-8.9 % during 2021-22, down from 8.7-9.9 % during 2011-12. The national logistics Policy will reduce the cost and enhance the competitiveness of Indian industry. -‘Logistic Cost in India: Assessment and Long-term Framework’ report by economic think-tank National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) & DPIIT

Key Terms/Issues : NCAER, DPIIT

#GS2: 04. OPEC+

Slowing demand growth and rising US crude production will make it more difficult for OPEC+ to continue to prop up prices.
-IEA

#GS3: 05. Migration from Sunderbans

Sundarbans has been called The cyclone capital of India because of the increasing frequency of cyclonic storms in the region. People here live on fishing And collecting honey.

Extreme weather events due to climate change is triggering migration in the region. In addition, repeated climatic disasters have translated into increasing salinity levels, making land unfit for agriculture.

When male members leave villages, and remain stuck in transit or in cities, it falls on the womenfolk to bail out the family. They sell off jewellery and other belongings.
-Commentay in News

#GS3: 06. COP-28

It was a long journey towards CoP-28 agreeing to transition away from fossil fuels in a just, orderly and equitable manner, but it also means no excuses are left not to do what must be done. The rich world needs to meet its promises while governments must ensure level playing fields and set out transition paths that offer policy stability. Consumers
should watch their lifestyles too.

With this, a year of climate related trepidation comes to an end—with an outcome that needs to be celebrated for its comprehensive inclusivity of actors, its commitment to action on mitigation and also adaptation, the pledging of finances towards the Loss and Damage Fund in particular, signaling ownership of responsibility, and many other wins. Most importantly, the outcome needs to be celebrated for aligning governments and industry, and indeed all other stake holders, towards an agenda that taken in isolation could topple governments and destabilize industrial giants—transitioning away from fossil fuels. Yes, this is less than a call for phasing out fossil fuels. But when it is an alysed in the context of science, which not only emphasizes the end goal of net zero but also the pathway to reach there, and of the ratcheting mechanism in the 2015 Paris Agreement, and of various pledges made at CoP-28on different aspects of the mitigation challenge—from tripling renewable energy and doubling energy efficiency to reducing cooling-related emissions by 68% and achieving near- zero upstream methane emissions—then there is indeed cause for celebration of a collective resolve.

-LEENA SRIVASTAVA, independent export on climate change and clean energy.

#GS2: 7. Sugar Taxation

We face a huge challenge in keeping our Population healthy. On one hand, there is malnutrition, and on the other, the incidence of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) is rising. A study by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR)on diabetes found that in2021,anestimated101million people in India were diabetic, while an estimated 136 million were pre-diabetic. The count of diabetics increased by 44% over the covid pandemic from 70 million in 2019.The International Diabetics Federations’ India Diabetes Report 2000-2045 called India the “diabetes capital of the world’, with 17% of the global diabetic population. It said That by 2045, 135 million Indians will suffer from diabetes. The illness can adversely Impact various organs of the body, leading to Huge health care costs for the government if no action is taken.

Focusing on sugar intake and its link to diseases like diabetes, the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends reducing the intake of free sugars to less than 10% of one’s total energy in take. Given the routine consumption of sugar as part of daily diets and its high content in products like sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs), many countries have designed taxes linked to sugar content. The assumption is that a sugar levy will make sugar-rich products dearer,
reduce their consumption and encourage companies to cut the sugar content in their products for a lighter tax burden. In the UK and elsewhere, some companies have re-formulated their products with reduced sugar to qualify for lower taxs labs. They have been innovative in doing so, showing that health- oriented research and development can aid the growth of beverage markets.
-ICRIER Economist Arpita Mukherjee

#GS3: 08. Informal Sector

The PLFS classifies ‘employment’ as people working for a regular salary wage, casual labour and those who are self-employed. The self-employed are further sub-categorized as those who are working on their own account(Code 11),as
employers (Code 12), and unpaid helpers in house-hold enterprises (Code 21). Codes 11 and 12 are clearly linked to the number of house hold enterprises, which are also part of the SME sector. Before proceeding, we must address a misconception around un paid family labour. This employment, which is sometimes bashed as being unproductive, is not necessarily so; in a family enterprise, all workers collectively draw up on the earnings of that business and are often actively involved in its running. The classification of a single member as the owner or employer is based on socio-cultural norms of naming the house hold head.

Between 2017-18and2022-23, the Worker Population Ratio (WPR) for all ages (rural + urban) rose significantly—from 34.7% to 41.1%.Thisrise, combined with the rise in India’s population over the same period, will give us an idea of the total number of employed. Further, the share of self-employed in the total workforce has also increased from52.2% to 57.3%.While the share of employers and own- account workers has remained more or less the same throughout, the rise in the WPR and aggregate population implies a substantial increase in the number of in formal enterprises.

-Ex-Chief Statistician TCA Ananth