International Organisations/GSII
India signs Host Country Agreement with the International Telecommunication

What's the NEWS

• Union Minister of Communications and Secretary General of International Telecommunication Union (ITU) signed the Host Country Agreement (HCA) for the establishment of an Area Office & Innovation Centre of ITU in New Delhi

International Telecommunication Union

• It is the United Nations specialised agency for information and communication technologies - ICTs.
• ITU currently has a membership of 193 countries and over 900 private-sector entities and academic institutions.
• The Area Office and Innovation Centre of ITU at New Delhi is expected to serve South Asian countries namely Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Iran, Maldives, Nepal, Sri Lanka and India.
• The Host Country Agreement provides the legal and financial framework for establishment and operations of the Area Office.
• The Area Office shall also have an Innovation Centre, which is expected to give impetus to research and development in telecommunication technologies in South Asia.
• The Innovation Centre will provide opportunities to academics, start-ups and SMEs to showcase their innovation at a global stage.
• With signing of the Host Country Agreement, the Area Office and the Innovation Centre is expected to be operational by mid 2022.

World Telecommunications Standardisation Assembly-20 (WTSA-20)

• The agreement was signed in a virtual ceremony during the World Telecommunications Standardisation Assembly-20 (WTSA-20) being held in Geneva, Switzerland.
• WTSA is a four-yearly global conference of ITU dedicated to standardisation of the Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs).
• India has proposed to host the next WTSA to be held in 2024.

Know! about 5Gi

• India has been taking concrete steps towards development of telecom standards.
• The 5Gi (indigenously developed sub-standard of 5G) standards developed within India have now been recognised by ITU as one of the three technologies for 5G.
• The 5G Radio Interface Technology, called 5Gi, is an initiative of the Telecommunications Standards Development Society, India (TSDSI), together with the academia, whose merger plan with the global 5G standards, will now be submitted to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and TEC.

Prelims Factoids
Arunachal Pradesh to get a Greenfield Airport in Hollongi

What's the NEWS

• Considering the importance of air connectivity to the capital city of Arunachal Pradesh, AAI has undertaken the work of constructing a Greenfield Airport in Hollongi, 15 Kms from Itanagar.
• The proposed airport is designed for operations of A-320 category of air craft and future extension of Runway by 500m length to cater A-321 type of aircraft.

Environment/GSIII
Historic resolution on Plastic Pollution adopted by 175 countries at the fifth United Nations Environment Assembly

What's the NEWS

• The resumed session of fifth United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA 5.2) held from 28th February 2022 to 2^nd March 2022 in Nairobi, considered three draft resolutions to address plastic pollution.
• One of the draft resolutions under consideration was that of India.
• The draft resolution submitted by India called for immediate collective voluntary action by countries.
• About 175 countries have adopted a resolution at the fifth United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) to end plastic pollution.

Session Highlights

• India engaged constructively with all member states in UNEA 5.2 to develop consensus on the resolution for driving global action on plastic pollution by setting up of an intergovernmental negotiating committee for a new international legally binding treaty.
• On the insistence of India, the principle of national circumstances and capability while taking actions to address plastic pollution was included in the text of the resolution to allow developing countries follow their development trajectories.
• India also stood for not mandating the inter-governmental negotiating committee with development of targets, definitions, formats and methodologies, at this stage, pre-judging the outcome of deliberations of the Committee.
• The provision for immediate collective voluntary actions by the countries was also included to address plastic pollution on urgent and continual basis.
• The principal objectives of India's draft resolution were sufficiently addressed in the resolution on "End plastic pollution: Towards an international legally binding instrument" adopted in the resumed fifth session of UNEA, which concluded on 2^nd March 2022.
• The resolution called for the member states to continue and step up activities and adopt voluntary measures to combat plastic pollution, including measures related to sustainable consumption and production.
• The measures might also include a circular economy approach, developing and implementing national action plans, while fostering international action and initiatives under respective national regulatory frameworks.
• Earlier, India had piloted a resolution on addressing single use plastic product pollution in the fourth United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) held in 2019, bringing global focus on the issue.

Steps taken by India

• The Ministry of Environment Forest and Climate Change has put in place a ban on identified single use plastic items, which have low utility and high littering potential.
• The Guidelines on Extended Producers Responsibility on plastic packaging have also been notified.
• The single use plastic ban coupled with extended producer responsibility guidelines provide legal framework for addressing plastic pollution.

Science and Technology/GSIII
India's first, Start-up in latest Daylight Harvesting Technology

What's the NEWS

• The Ministry of Science & Technology has decided to promote a unique Start-up in latest Daylight Harvesting Technology in order to reduce carbon footprint and improve the building energy efficiency.
• The only Start-up company in India for Daylight Harvesting Technologies "Skyshade Daylights Private Limited" Hyderabad signed an MoU with Technology Development Board, a statutory body of Department of Science & Technology

Know! more about Daylight Harvesting Technologies

• TDB will give Rs 5 Crore of the 10 Crore project to Skyshade company for developing new technologies for basement illumination on 24x7 basis.
• The Start-up has now come up with two more innovative solutions naming Human centric-climate adaptive building facades and Central integrated daylighting system.
• These two systems will give new horizon to the daylighting and these products are easily affordable, adaptable and economically viable.
• Daylighting is basically bringing natural sunlight inside the rooms.
• The solar energy spectrum has 45% energy as visible light and this can be used to harvest building illumination for about 9-11 hours a day.
• The Technology used is completely indigenous, economically viable and easy to deploy and needs minimal maintenance with longevity.
• The proposed technologies, harvest huge quantities of sunlight for a building and make available for building illumination which reduces electrical lighting energy consumption by 70-80%, besides reducing air-conditioning (cooling load) consumption
• Meeting our energy requirement during the day by using daylight harvesting technology will contribute immensely to meet one of the commitments of the five nectars of "PANCHAMRIT" i.e., to make India as Net Zero emission country by 2070.
• The country has set an ambitious target to achieve a capacity of 175 GW of its energy requirement from renewable energy sources by the end of 2022, and committed to achieve 500 GW by 2030 as stated by Prime Minister at the COP26 summit in Glasgow.

Defence/Indigenisation of Technology/GSIII
MoD accords in-principle approval to four projects under Make-I (Government Funded) & five under Make-II (industry-funded) categories of Defence Acquisition Procedure 2020

What's the NEWS

• Ministry of Defence (MoD) has offered four projects to the Indian Industry for design & development under Make-I category of Defence Acquisition Procedure (DAP) 2020.
• The industry will be provided financial support for prototype development of these projects.

The list of projects which were accorded ‘Approval In-Principle (AIP)' by Collegiate Committee of MoD is as follow:

• Indian Air Force: Communication Equipment with Indian Security Protocols (Routers, Switches, Encryptors, VoIP Phones and their software)
• Indian Air Force: Airborne Electro Optical pod with Ground Based System
• Indian Air Force: Airborne Stand-off Jammer
• Indian Army: Indian Light Tank

This is for the first time since the launch of industry-friendly DAP-2020 that Indian Industry has been involved in development of big ticket platforms such as Light tank and Communication Equipment with Indian security protocols.
In addition, AIP has also been accorded to following five projects under industry-funded Make-II procedure:

• Indian Air Force: Full Motion Simulator for Apache Helicopter
• Indian Air Force: Full Motion Simulator for Chinook Helicopter
• Indian Air Force: Wearable Robotic Equipment for Aircraft Maintenance
• Indian Army: Integrated Surveillance and Targeting System for Mechanised Forces
• Indian Army: Autonomous Combat Vehicle
• Projects under 'Make-II' category involve prototype development of equipment/system/platform or their upgrades or their sub-systems/sub-assembly/assemblies/components, primarily for import substitution/innovative solutions, for which no Government funding will be provided for prototype development purposes.
• The indigenous development of these projects in the country will help harness the design capabilities of Indian defence Industry and position India as a design leader in these technologies.

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