‘Tigers and Tourism’, UMANG Mobile App, “Sweet Revolution and Atma Nirbhar Bharat”
1. Promoting Beekeeping under Atma Nirbhar Abhiyan
- Government is promoting Beekeeping as part of its aim to double farmers’ income.
- Government has allocated Rs.500 crore towards Beekeeping under the Atma Nirbhar Abhiyan.
- India is among the world’s top five honey producers.
- Compared to 2005-06 honey production has risen by 242% and exports shot by 265%.
- As evident by the rising honey exports, beekeeping will be an important factor in achieving the goal of doubling farmers’ income by 2024.
- National Bee Board has created four modules to impart training as part of the National Beekeeping and Honey Mission (NBHM) and 30 lakh farmers have been trained in beekeeping. They are also being financially supported by the Government.
- Government has launched ‘Honey Mission’ as part of ‘Sweet Revolution’ which has four components. Even small and marginal farmers can adopt beekeeping since investment is low and returns high.
- Issues before beekeepers such as promotion of scientific beekeeping, quality assurance, minimum support price, transport of bee colonies, processing, packaging, branding, testing, organic certification of honey and different beehive products were also there.
- However, Successful beekeepers and entrepreneurs from Kashmir, West Bengal, Uttarakhand, Bihar, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh shared their experiences and suggested ways forward to bring about the Sweet Revolution.
- “Sweet Revolution and Atma Nirbhar Bharat” The objective was to popularize scientific beekeeping as source of livelihood for landless rural poor, small and marginal famers to supplement agricultural income, as also as tool to enhance agriculture and horticulture production.
- Also, It will attract participation of beekeepers, honey processors, marketing and branding professionals, research scholars, academicians, cooperators from major honey producing states, representatives of State and Union Governments, international organizations such as FAO and NEDAC, Bangkok.
2. ‘Medical Devices and API sector: Challenges & Emerging Opportunities’
- Japanese companies invited to invest in Indian Pharmaceutical and Medical Devices industry
- India has taken several initiatives offering huge Opportunity to the investors : Pharma Secy Dr Waghela
- India to Japan shared his valuable thoughts on the golden opportunity for India and Japan to further boost their relationship in the context of the ongoing COVID-19 crisis.
- Pharmaceuticals, the Department’s schemes to promote manufacturing of bulk drugs and medical devices via Production Linked Incentive schemes and Promotion of Bulk Drug/Medical Devices Parks and requested the delegates to avail benefits of the schemes.
- Pharmaceutical Traders Association and Japan Federation of Medical Devices Associations deliberated on the Post COVID-19 challenges & opportunities for Pharmaceutical & Medical Device sectors and its impact on the global supply chain and suggested that cooperation between the two countries can contribute to stabilize the supply-chain of especially APIs and Medical Devices. Representative of JETRO Chennai also shared insights on challenges and emerging opportunities in API sector and Medical Devices.
- Japanese subsidiaries Nipro India Corp and Eisai Pharmaceuticals India Pvt Ltd shared a detailed presentation and their experience about ‘Make in India’ program is discussed.
- Representatives of State Governments of Gujarat, Telangana, Himachal Pradesh and Goa offered finer details of the investment opportunities in their respective States including package for incentives and taxation benefits, ease of doing business initiatives, land availability, infrastructural facilities, regulatory framework and invited Japanese companies for investing in their respective States.
3. India Post to work towards Atma Nirbhar Bharat
First “Make in India” Video Conference Solution developed by C-DOT.
Highlights of the Covid efforts of India Post are:
- More than 2000 tonnes of medicines and medical equipment were booked and delivered to needy individuals and hospitals across the country.
- Road Transport Network running more than 25000 Kms daily and carrying more than 75 tonnes of mails and parcels, was introduced to strengthen the supply chain.
- Around Rs.1500 Crore disbursed at the door step using Aadhar enabled Payment System (AePS) of India Post Payments Bank to around 85 lakh beneficiaries.
- 75 lakh electronic money orders (EMO) payments made under various schemes of financial inclusion worth Rs.760 Crore.
- Direct Benefit Transfers (DBT) payments worth Rs.1100 crore disbursed in beneficiary accounts.
- Around 6 lakh food and ration packets were distributed to labourers, municipal workers etc. through self-contribution and in association with NGOs.
The CPMGs shared the activities undertaken as a dedicated team effort of postal staff. Different circles excelled in different activities like:
- Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh pioneered in tie ups with pharmaceutical and medicine company and providing logistic solution.
- Bihar, Uttar Pradesh , Gujarat , Andhra Pradesh , Rajasthan , Punjab and Telangana have been leading states in financial inclusion.
- Delhi , West Bengal and Maharashtra circles performed well in ensuring the gateway for North, North East and Southern states of the country.
- Haryana , Karnatka , Kerala circles developed customised apps for receiving service request from public and fulfilment thereof.
Certain innovative models of service delivery and promoting regional specialities were also shared by the CPMGs such as :
- Jammu & Kashmir has finalised delivery of Prasad of Mata Vaishno Devi Temple and Saffron from Kashmir across the country shortly.
- Punjab is promoting booking and distribution of Indian medicines through post offices and also in association with CSCs.
- Bihar excelled in taking “Apka Bank Apke Dwar” with around 11.65 lakh disbursal worth Rs.147 crore.
The following priority areas in post-Covid situation for the Department:
- Provide logistics support for Indian Systems of Medicines that include Ayurveda , Unani , Siddha etc. in different parts of the country.
- “Dakiya” should become first resource for collecting database of migrants, their skill sets, opening of their accounts and facilitate payments under MGNREGA and other Govt. Schemes.
- India Post should prepare strategic plan, dovetailing suggestions from the field, to become flag bearer of an Indian Supply Chain through which tele-medicine, agri-products, handicrafts, artisan products and other local specialities can be connected from producer to ultimate buyer eliminating the middleman.
- He emphasised that experience gained from distribution of medicines and essential items during Covid period has created this opportunity to scale-up the model.
- The Minister also appreciated the good work of the postal employees and officers in their role as “Covid Warriors”.
3. UMANG Mobile Application (App)
- The Unified Mobile Application for New-age Governance (UMANG) has been inaugurated on 22 May,2020.
- UMANG is a Government of India all-in-one single, unified, secure, multi-channel, multi-platform, multi-lingual, multi-service mobile app, powered by a robust back-end platform providing access to high impact services of various organization (Central and State).
- The Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi launched the UMANG App in 2017 to bring all government services on a single mobile app, with a larger goal to make the government accessible on the mobile phone of our citizens. About 660 services from 127 department & 25 states, including utility payments are live and more are in pipeline.
- India Meteorological Department (IMD) has taken various initiatives in recent years for improvement in dissemination of weather forecast and warning services based on latest tools and technologies. To further enhance this initiative, IMD has taken the leverage of Digital India Programme to utilise “UMANG App”.
- The following 7 services hosted on http://mausam.imd.gov.in web site of IMD have been onboarded to UMANG Application.
a) Current Weather – Current temperature, humidity, wind speed, direction for 150 cities updated 8 times a day. Information on Sunrise/ sunset and moonrise/ moonset are also given.
b) Nowcast – Three hourly warnings of localized weather phenomena and their intensity issued for about 800 stations, and districts of India by State Meteorological Centers of IMD. In case of severe weather, its impact also is included in the warning.
c) City Forecast – Past 24 hours and 7 day forecast of weather conditions around 450 cities in India are given.
d) Rainfall Information – All India district Rainfall information daily, weekly, monthly and cumulative series are available.
e) Tourism Forecast – Past 24 hours and 7 day forecast of weather conditions of around 100 Tourist cities in India are provided.
f) Warnings – The alert issued to warn citizens of approaching dangerous weather. It is colour coded in Red, Orange and yellow are the alert levels with Red as the most severe category. Issued twice a day for all districts for the coming five days.
g) Cyclone – Cyclone warnings and alerts provides the track of cyclonic storms along with likely time and point of crossing of coast. Impact based warnings, area/district wise, are issued so that appropriate preparation including evacuation of vulnerable areas can be done.
4. 'Tigers and Tourism' under "Dekho Apna Desh"
- The Ministry of Tourism organised its latest webinar on ‘Tigers and Tourism’ under Dekho Apna Desh Webinar.
- The webinar was all about unveiling the rich heritage of tiger habitation in India and its relevance with tourism in India.
- Tigers and Tourism with a time travel back during his teens when he would read books by the famous British hunter Jim Corbett and eventually got inspired to document the wild big cats for a living.
- The intrinsic connection has been successfully seen through south western communities of India who represent their reverence for tigers by painting themselves in tiger stripes walking from temple to temple and village to village.
- Huli Vesha or Pili Yesais a folk dance famous in coastal Karnataka performed during Navratri to honour the Goddess Durga whose favoured animal is the tiger.
- 70% of world’s tiger population is found in diverse habitats of India with about 15 species of big cats presently existing in 50 reserves spread across the country.
- Starting from Jim Corbett National Park, Uttarakhand in the north to the moist lands of Kaziranga National Park in Assam(north east) and the Sunderbans of West Bengal (east) to the dry lands of Ranthambore National Park in Rajasthan, Kanha and Bandhavgarh Tiger reserves in Madhya Pradesh, central India, to many other reserves in the rainforests of Western Ghats such as Nagarhole National Park, Periyar Tiger reserve, Bandipur National Park and Anamalai Tiger reserve, Madumalai National Park in southern India amongst many others, these large animals have been preserved in different arrays of habitats.
- India’s astounding diversity in wildlife draws people to visit the country in large numbers and such crowding may be a threat to the animals, tigers in general, if sustainability is not made the focal point.
Note:
- The Dekho Apna Desh Webinar series, launched on 14th April 2020, till date has conducted 22 sessions showcasing the varied tourism products and experiences that India offers across the country.
- This series has attracted a viewership of over 90,000 persons till date.
- The National e-Governance Division (NeGD) created by the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY) has been playing a pivotal role in supporting the Ministry in conducting of the DekhoApna Desh Webinars by providing technical assistance directly with a professional team.
