The Indonesians are moving to a new capital. It is East Kalimantan. It is now called ‘Nusantara’. Earlier, Jakarta was the capital of Indonesia.
East Kalimantan or Jakarta is located in the Borneo island. The plan to shift the capital here was announced in 2019. It was announced by President Joko Widodo.
Jakarta has been the capital of Indonesia since 1949. Jakarta is facing environmental and financial issues. Pollution is increasing in Jakarta. It has been consistently ranked as one of the most polluted cities in the world. Jakarta is in Java island. And Nusantara is in Borneo island. The size of Borneo island is larger than Java island. Currently, Jakarta is densely populated. This is adding to the burden borne by the Indonesian Government. Also, Jakarta is sinking. By 2050, most of the Jakarta is expected to go under water. This is mainly because Jakarta is surrounded by several rivers. These rivers are prone to frequent floods. Between 2019 and 2020 many cities in Jakarta sank up to 10.7 cm.
All the government institutions, presidential palace, international organization buildings and foreign embassy buildings are to be moved to Nusantara. It is to cost 33 billion USD to execute the plan. Around 2,56,142 hectares of land has been allocated to build the capital city.
Nusantara means archipelago. It represents philosophical, sociological and historical aspects.
Nusantara is rich in biodiversity. According to the environmentalists, moving the capital to Nusantara will lead to massive deforestation. Also, it will put the trees and animals in the region at danger.
The other countries that recently changed its capital are as follows:
The Best FIFA Football Awards are presented by the FIFA (Federation Internationale de Football Association). It was first awarded in 2017. It revived the FIFA World Player of the year, which was presented by FIFA till 2015.
It is a predecessor to the Best FIFA Football Awards. It was presented between 1991 and 2015. It was also presented by FIFA. The best player nominees were selected by the captains, coaches and media representatives. Marta was the youngest player to receive the award. She is a Brazilian player and has won the award five times. Ronaldo was yet another player to receive the award at the youngest age. He received it when he was 20 years old.
Most of the FIFA awards, be it the recently launched Best FIFA Football Awards or the FIFA World Player awards were mostly won by the Brazilian players. The other player who frequently win FIFA awards are from France, Portugal and Italy.
It is a non – profit organization. It is an international governing body of futsal, football and beach soccer. Futsal is played on hard court. It is a mini football game. It is closely related to five – a – side football and indoor soccer.
The asteroid 1994 PC1 is to pass by earth on January 18, 2022. It will pass by at a distance of 1.2 million miles. This is five times the distance between moon and the earth. Therefore, the asteroid will not cause any harm to the earth. It is also known by the name “7482”. Its length is more than one kilometer. That is, 3,450 feet. Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world is 2,722 feet.
Travelling speed of the asteroid is 45,000 miles per hour. It is a stony asteroid. It is put under the category of potentially hazardous asteroid and also under the near – earth object category.
It orbits around the sun at 0.9 to 1.8 AU. It takes an ecliptic orbit. According to light curve analysis, the rotation period of the asteroid is 2.599 hours. Light curve is tracking the light intensity of a celestial body.
It was first discovered by Goldstone radar in 1997. The Goldstone observatory is located in Mojave desert. It belongs to NASA. It mainly tracks the space missions of NASA.
It is a S – type asteroid. These asteroids are made of siliceous minerals, that is, mainly silica. Around 17% of the asteroids in the solar system are S – type asteroids. The most common are the C – type, that is, the carbonaceous.
The Asteroid 1994 PC1 is an unnamed minor planet. Minor planets are those celestial bodies that orbit directly around the sun. Unlike the moons that orbit around a planet, the minor planets orbit around the sun. They are neither a planet nor a comet. It includes asteroids, main – belt asteroids, near earth objects, distant minor planets such as trans – Neptunian object and centaurs. Also, most of the celestial bodies that are in the Kupier belt are minor planets. Ceres was the first minor planet. It was discovered in 1801.
The deep sea scientists have found an icefish breeding colony in the Weddell sea of Antarctica. The scientific name of the icefish is Neopagrtopsis ionah.
The species was discovered in February 2021. However, their breeding nests were discovered recently.
The blood of the ice fish is transparent in colour. They do not have red blood cells. They do not have haemoglobin to transport oxygen. It is an evolutionary adaptation. It is not a happy evolution. They absorb oxygen through their skin. They have huge hearts. They were found at a depth of 90 metres to 200 metres.
The ice fish nests were found in a warm patch of water. This was unique and strange to the scientists. The temperature of the water here was 35 degrees Fahrenheit.
Around 31 miles from the current breeding spot, the scientists discovered another patch of nests. Those nests were abandoned. They are now occupied by corals and sponges.
It is located in the southern ocean. More than 10,000 square kilometres of ice in the Weddell sea disappeared in 2002. The sea has the clearest water.
A group of hundred billionaires have submitted a plea to the World Economic Forum. The title of the plea is “Make us Pay more tax”
A group of millionaires and billionaires have issued a plea. The group calls themselves as “Patriotic Millionaires”. They are of the view that the ultra wealthy are not contributing their share towards the global recovery from the pandemic. This is because of unfair tax system. According to them, they have witnessed wealth gain while the rest of the world suffered in different angles. And so they want to pay a fair share of their earnings to the global recovery.
The “Make us pay more tax” plea suggests to make a deal with the big companies. These companies will have to pay a minimum tax of 15% of their annual turnover. In most of the countries the rich need not pay annual taxes on assets such as stocks, artworks or real estates. This is because; these assets are taxed only when they are sold.
The world went into one of its worst recession since World War II. And on the other hand, the millionaires became billionaires and the billionaires accumulated more and more wealth. The fortune of the top ten billionaires increased at the rate of 15,000 USD per second! Also, their wealth increased to 1.5 trillion USD.
Taxing the millionaires earning 5 million USD per year at 2% and taxing billionaires at 5% will bring in 2.52 trillion USD. This is enough to lift 2.3 billion people out of poverty. Also, this amount is sufficient to guarantee social protection and health care.
No wealth tax is collected in most of South American countries except Columbia and Argentina. In 2021, the World Bank urged the countries to consider wealth tax.
The billionaires are pushing for wealth tax because it helps to replenish the state through COVID-19 relief schemes, reduce inequality and also regain social trust.
LEAP is the new start up programme of Flipkart. It is also called Leap Ahead. It aims to help the start ups in India. Under this LEAP programme, Flipkart is to implement two programmes. They are FLIN and FLA. FLIN is Flipkart Leap Innovation Network. FLA is Flipkart Leap Ahead.
It will invest in start ups focusing on cutting edge technologies. Also, it will invest in startups that are working on innovative technologies that are of priority to the company. The selected start ups will work with the tech and product teams of Flipkart.
The programme will identify start ups in fintech, logistics, supply chain, alternate commerce, agritech, social health tech, B2B and edtech.
The LEAP programme is a part of the seed – stage investment of Flipkart. In 2021, Flipkart announced 100 million USD as seed fund for the Indian start ups. LEAP is a part of this investment plan of Flipkart.
In July 2021, Flipkart selected 8 startups under the programme. These start ups participated in a 16 – week training like programme conducted by Flipkart. They attended workshops, one – to – one mentor sessions and classes from industrial experts to speed up the development of startups in the country.
To help the startups navigate through different challenges faced by the entrepreneurs. The startups in following areas shall apply for the programme:
Novak Djokovic has not taken the COVID vaccine. Therefore, the Australian Government considers the Serbian player as a threat to the country. This is why the top ranked tennis player was deported from Australia.
Australian Open is one of the four important tournaments of the Grand Slam. It was to start on January 17, 2022. And Novak was to play on Day 1. Unfortunately a day before the game, the Australian court deported Novak for not taking COVID vaccine. The 34 – year old player is one of the most high – profile COVID vaccine sceptics in the world. Sceptics are persons who are doubtful about a thing or situation.
According to Australian Government, Novak has huge fan followers. On one side, he poses threat to the country as he is not vaccinated. On the other hand, his attitude towards vaccine will foster anti – vaccination sentiment among his huge fans not only in Australia but also in the other parts of the world.
The Australian Government allows only vaccinated people to enter into the country. Novak is from Serbia. He entered Australia by seeking medical exemption from Victorian state. Later, he was detained for not taking vaccine. The visa of the unvaccinated player was cancelled on health and good order grounds.
Australia Open is one of the most important Grand slam tournaments. The other three Grand Slam tournaments are US Open, French Open, and Wimbledon. Not everyone can participate in these tournaments. It is conducted among the top rank holders in the world. The ranks are assigned based on the winning ratio of these players. If a player wins more number of Grand Slam matches, his rank moves up. Right now Novak is in the top most position. Not playing the Australian Open will affect his ranking.
The scientists of CRS have created a climate hazards and vulnerability atlas of India. CRS is Climate Research and Services and it operates under India Meteorological Department (IMD).
The scientists created the map based on 14 extreme weather events. They also considered the risks and threats imposed by these 14 weather events on the local population and their economy. Here ‘local’ is pertained to district and not state or village.
Every year, the Indian Meteorological Department celebrates its foundation day on January 14. The map was launched during this year’s celebrations. It was launched by the Union Minister of Earth Sciences Dr Jitendra Singh. The IMD was established in 1875. It operates under Minister of Earth Science. It is responsible for meteorological observations, seismology and weather events. It is one of the six regional meterological centres of the World Meteorological Organization.
Lightning causes highest casualties in India. It is followed by floods, cyclones and fog. They also cause high economic and livelihood losses.
The headquarters of CRS is located in Pune. It provides weather forecast, AWS data, gridded data, radiation data, agro met data, and meteorological data.
The atlas helps to take precautionary measures. It uses disaster data, hourly autographic data, cyclone track data, daily rainfall data, population density data, storm surge data, etc.