India and World Current Affairs February 2017

India Signed Agreement with the IBRD

India signed agreement with the IBRD for $ 5.19 million for Additional Financing for Financing Energy Efficiency at MSMEs Project— Programmatic Framework for Energy Efficiency on December 13, 2016.
The development objective of the project was to increase demand for energy efficiency investments in select micro, small and medium enterprise clusters and to build their capacity to access commercial finance.
The parent project currently has a Satisfactory rating towards achievement of Project Development Objective (PDO), and implementation performance.

Pakistan Lifted ‘Undeclared’ Ban on Indian Cotton Imports

Pakistan lifted an ‘undeclared’ ban on import of ginned cotton from India, days after rejecting a consignment of 10000 bales of cotton from India citing violation of plant quarantine rules by importers on December 7, 2016.
Pakistan imported ginned cotton worth more than $ 800 million from India which accounted for two-thirds of India’s cotton exports.
Last year, a drop of 27% in domestic cotton output shaved 0.5% off gross domestic product growth rate of Pakistan.

REPORTS

Global Wage Report 2016-17 Released

India had among the worst levels of gender wage disparity i.e., men earning more than women in similar jobs with the gap exceeding 30%, the Global Wage Report 2016-17 released by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) on December 22, 2016.
In contrast, Singapore had among the lowest, at 3%. Among major economies, only South Korea fared worse than India, with a gap of 37%. The report also found that the share of women among wage earners was among the lowest in South Asia.
Compared to a global average of 40%, and an Asia-Pacific average of 38%, in South Asia (whose dominant economy is India), only 20% of wage earners were women.

Global Terrorism Index 2016 Released

India ranked seventh in the list of countries most affected by terrorism in 2015, according to the Global Terrorism Index (GTI) 2016 released by the Institute for Economics & Peace, a Sydney-based think-tank on December 8, 2016.
The report gave India a GTI rank of seven and GTI score of 7.484. The GTI score for a country is based on weightage assigned to the total number of terrorism-related incidents, fatalities, injuries and property damage sustained in the year in question.
The index also takes into consideration attacks that took place in the four previous years. The country most affected by terrorism last year was Iraq, with 2415 terrorist incidents, causing 6960 deaths and 11900 injuries, followed by Afghanistan, which suffered 1715 terrorist incidents, which caused 5312 deaths and 6249 injuries.
Nigeria, Pakistan, Syria and Yemen were ranked behind these countries, in that order. The situation in Somalia, Egypt and Libya was worse than that in India, with Libya figuring on the 10th place in the ranking.

MEETING and CONFERENCE

India to Host Global Conference on Cyber Space in 2017

India will host the fifth edition of the Global Conference on Cyber Space (GCCS) in 2017 in which over 100 countries are expected to participate, IT and Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad announced on December 20, 2016.
The UK had hosted the first GCCS in 2011 followed by Budapest in 2012. South Korea hosted the event 2013 and the Netherlands in 2015.
The GCCS will deliberate on issues related to promotion of cooperation in cyberspace, norms for responsible behavior in cyberspace and to enhance cyber capacity building.

6th BRICS Health Ministers’ Meeting Held

The BRICS countries, represented by the Ministers of Health of the Federative Republic of Brazil, the Russian Federation, Republic of India, People’s Republic of China and Republic of South Africa, met in New Delhi on December 16, 2016 at the Sixth BRICS Health Ministers Meeting on December 16, 2016.
Recalled the previous BRICS Health Ministers declarations and joint communiques in which they committed to strengthen intra-BRICS cooperation to promote health, acknowledged the renewed commitment to health by the BRICS leaders as expressed in the Goa Declaration of October, 2016.