1 / 8

Daily Current Affairs October 17, 2024

daily current affairs

avadhojha
Download Presentation

Daily Current Affairs October 17, 2024

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Prelims General Studies III Science and Technology Artificial Intelligence Research Hubs Context Recently, the Central Government announced the setting up of three AI research hubs on Health, Agriculture and Sustainable Cities. Prelims 1. Consider the following statements with reference to the Artificial Intelligence Research Hubs: 1) These hubs will be created in the fields of healthcare, agriculture and sustainable cities. 2) Ministry of Education is the nodal agency for its implementation. Which of the following statement (s) is/are correct?

  2. A. 1 only B. 2 Only C. Both 1 and 2 D. Neither 1 nor 2 Answer: C About ● The central government has approved the setting up of three Centres of Excellence (CoE) in artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare, agriculture and sustainable cities. ● Nodal Ministry: Ministry of Education ● Centre of Excellence on Healthcare: It will be developed by the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) and the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Delhi. ● Centre of Excellence on Agriculture: It will be developed by IIT in Ropar, Punjab. ● Centre of Excellence on Sustainable Cities: It will be developed by IIT-Kanpur. ● Funding: These AI-CoEs were announced in budget with an outlay of ₹990 crore over the period of 2023-24 to 2027-28. ● Implementing Agency: An industry-heavy apex committee has been formed to oversee the implementation of the project. ● Currently, the committee is being led by Zoho founder-CEO Sridhar Vembu. Zoho Corporation is a technology company which provides a cloud-based software suite for businesses.

  3. IndiaAI Mission: Government’s Stride in the Artificial Intelligence Field ● The India-AI Mission was launched by the government in March 2024 to promote the Artificial Intelligence Ecosystem in India. ● IndiaAI is being implemented through a public-private partnership model. It is aimed at nurturing India’s AI innovation ecosystem. Components of IndiaAI

  4. IndiaAI Compute Capacity ● It will help to erect a cutting-edge, scalable AI computing infrastructure by deploying over 10,000 Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) through strategic public-private collaborations. IndiaAI Startup Financing Mechanism ● It aims to facilitate streamlined access to funding for budding AI startups and catalyse their journey from product development to commercialisation. ● It also includes funding provisions for industry-led AI projects aimed at fostering social impact and propelling innovation and entrepreneurship. IndiaAI Innovation Centre (IAIC) ● The mission aims to set up a leading academic institution for streamlined implementation and retention of top research talent.

  5. ● IndiaAI Innovation Centre aims to fulfil these objectives of the mission. ● It will facilitate the development and deployment of foundational models, with a specific emphasis on indigenous Large Multimodal Models (LMMs) and domain-specific models, leveraging edge and distributed computing for optimal efficiency. IndiaAI Datasets Platform ● It will be developed by the Independent Business Division (IBD) of IndiaAI. ● It aims to enhance the accessibility, quality, and utility of public sector datasets. ● It will also ensure data-driven governance and catalyze AI-based innovation and research. IndiaAI FutureSkills program ● It will focus on expanding the reach of AI education by increasing the accessibility of graduate and post-graduate AI programs. ● Under the program, Data and AI Labs will be established across major Indian cities and smaller towns. These labs will impart foundational-level courses in Data and AI. Sources: Press Information Bureau, The Hindu Mains General Studies III Economics/Agriculture Food-Sufficient VS Access to Food: The Problems of ‘Hunger and Malnutrition’ in India Context Although India is self-sufficient in food production still it lags in the global hunger index due to a lack of access to food.

  6. Mains 1. “Despite being one of the largest producers of food, India lags behind many underdeveloped countries in the Global Hunger Index’. Discuss. Approach 1. Introduce food security in India and its position in GHI. 2. Discuss various factors which have caused India to underperform in GHI. 3. Conclude with a need to frame strong policies to effectively push India towards attaining ‘Zero Hunger’. About ● October 16 is celebrated as ‘World Food Day’ across the globe. The theme of the year, 2024 is ‘Right to Foods for a Better Life and a Better Future’. ● It highlights the importance of access to safe, nutritious, and affordable food for all. ● Although India is self-sufficient in food production still it lags in the Global Hunger Index. ● The Global Hunger Index which was released by the Irish Humanitarian Organization, Concern Worldwide and the German aid agency, Welthungerhilfe (WHH) has ranked India 105thout of 127 countries in the Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2024. ● It is a cause of great concern for India that despite running the World’s largest food security Program in the form of the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY), it lags behind many underdeveloped countries in the ranking. Reasons Behind Lack of Access of Food to Indian Masses Lack of Distributional Mechanism ● Food insecurity and malnutrition are caused mainly due to lack of access to food and healthy diets. ● Hunger can only be addressed through food sufficiency. But there is a need for an ideal distributional mechanism for a nation like India which is food-sufficient but still lags behind in ‘re-distribution of food among masses.’

  7. ● Only a well-developed distributional mechanism will ensure universal access to food that is affordable. Lack of Healthy and Balanced Diets ● The unaffordability of Healthy Diets, unhealthy food intakes and their underlying inequalities across the population Segment in India has led to ‘Malnourishment’. ● Hence, there is a need for a transformation from a hunger-free environment to a nutritionally compliant one to tackle the problem of undernourishment. ● According to a study conducted by LANCET called EAT-LANCET reference, diets in India are generally unhealthy and there is an imbalance in composition. ● Further, the study also opined that the standards of diet mentioned in the EAT-LANCET reference are unaffordable for low-income populations. ● For example, in South Asia, a reference diet might cost 60% of the mean daily per capita household income. ● Hence, the lack of affordability of healthy foods may be one of the reasons for their low consumption in India. Lack of Purchasing Capacity ● Lack of purchasing capacity is also one of the reasons behind the prevalence of undernourishment. ● Inequality in India is prevalent which has led to a gap in purchasing power capacity between rich and poor. ● Further, the Cost And Affordability Of A Healthy Diet (CoHD) is also significant as large populations in India and the world are not able to procure the ever-increasing food prices. ● The cost of a healthy diet has risen in recent years peaking at an average of 3.96 purchasing power parity (PPP) dollars per person per day in 2022. It varies across world regions in PPP terms. It is at $4.20 in Asia. ● In the Indian context, according to a study, the share of the rural Indian population in 2011 unable to afford the cost of a required diet (CoRD) even with 100% income spent on food would be 63.3% or 527.4 million

  8. ● Hence, like the rest of the world, India is witnessing a lack of improvement in food security and uneven progress in economic access to healthy diets. Global Hunger Assessment ● An assessment of hunger and undernourishment globally shows that the global magnitude of undernourishment has risen to 9.4% or 757 million people as of 2023. ● Hunger is disproportionate in the African region with 20.4% of the population facing hunger. ● In this comparison, 8.1% of the population in Asia, 6.2% in Latin America and the Caribbean and 7.3% population in Oceania are undernourished. ● But if it is seen as the number of people, Asia is home to the largest magnitude of those who are hungry with 384.5 million people as compared with 298.4 million in Africa. ● If the current trends of hunger and undernourishment are followed up, by the end of this decade, i.e., 2030, half of the world’s hungry/undernourished will be in Africa. Conclusion In India, although lack of affordability of food has been countered by food security schemes and hence it is not an issue. Further, it has been assessed that the richest 5% of Indian households to consume less protein-rich food than processed food. Hence, there is a need for the government and policymakers to counter the availability, accessibility, awareness, and acceptability of baskets of food items to counter hunger and malnutrition in the counter. It will also help India to achieve Sustainable Development Goals such as Zero Hunger (SDG 2). Sources: FAO, The Hindu, GHI

More Related