Current Affairs Quiz - March, 2020

Notes:
ICDS-Common Application Software (CAS) is developed under the POSHAN Abhiyaan (Prime Minister’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nutrition). It is a flagship programme to improve nutritional outcomes for children, pregnant women and lactating mothers.
Recently it was seen in news as the Women and Child Development Ministry announced that Anganwadi Workers are provided with Smart phone through States, for ICDS-Common Application Software developed under POSHAN Abhiyaan, for efficient service delivery and monitoring.

Notes:
Union Consumer Affairs Ministry announced that the government has declared face masks and hand sanitizers as essential commodities up to June 30, 2020, by amending the schedule of the Essential Commodities Act 1955.
This decision will enable the government and States/Union Territories to regulate the production, quality and distribution of masks and hand sanitizers. Hence these commodities would be made available to all common citizens in affordable prices without hoarding and black-marketing.

Notes:
The Cabinet has recently approved building 780-km Green National Highway project at a cost of Rs 7,660 crore. It includes upgradation of various National Highways in four states – Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh.
The aim of the ‘Green Highways (Plantation, Transplantation, Beautification & Maintenance) Policy’ is to promote greening of Highway corridors with participation of the community. 1% of the total project cost of all highway projects will be kept aside for highway plantation and its maintenance.

Notes:
The ‘BhoomiRashi’ Portal is a land acquisition portal launched in March 2018 by the Ministry of the Road Transport and Highways.
It was seen in news as the Ministry announced that the portal has significantly accelerated the process of land acquisition for National Highways, by reducing the processing time to less than two weeks in a majority of cases. The acquisition process is made error-free and more transparent as it has been integrated with the Public Financial Management System (PFMS).

Notes:
According to the findings of the Gender Social Norms Index report, released recently by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), no country in the world has achieved gender equality.
The report also revealed that the world is not on track to achieve gender equality by 2030 and it would take 257 years to close the gender gap in economic opportunity. Pakistan tops a list of countries of people holding biased views against women.

Notes:
Sadanand Fulzele, the founder secretary of the Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Smarak Samiti, recently passed away at the age of 91.
The federation looks after Deekshabhoomi in Nagpur, the site of Babasaheb Ambedkar’s conversion to Buddhism in 1956. Fulzele was a follower of Ambedkar’s ideologies and was instrumental in building the stupa at the place. Fulzele was also the Deputy Mayor of Nagpur when the leader converted along with over 6 lakh followers.

Notes:
A passenger ferry service called ‘Ropax’ was launched between Mumbai and Mandwa of Maharashtra by the Union Minister of State for Shipping Mansukh Mandaviya.
The vessel which can carry as many as 200 cars and 1,000 passengers was built in Greece. The Ropax jetty and terminal at Mandwa has been built by Maharashtra Maritime Board while the jetty facilities at Mumbai were set up by Mumbai Port Trust.

Notes:
Microsoft Bing team has launched a web portal for tracking COVID-19 infections worldwide. The interactive website has been developed to provide up-to-date infection statistics for each country.
It also features an interactive map for number of cases for specific location and related articles from publishers. The portal hosts the data from reliable sources like the World Health Organization (WHO), the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC).

Notes:
The United States has begun the first phase of clinical trial of a vaccine to protect against the coronavirus disease.
The initiative is supported by a global coalition founded by India and Norway. It is funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The first participant received the investigatory vaccine in the trial, which is to enrol 45 healthy adult volunteers for approximately six weeks.

Notes:
‘World Cities Summit’ is a global biennial conference hosted by Singapore. This year, World Cities Summit (WCS) 2020 is scheduled to be held from July 5 to 9.
The theme of this year’s summit as announced by the Singapore government is ‘Liveable and Sustainable Cities: Adapting to a Disrupted World’. Leaders from several governments and industry experts discuss on challenges in climate change, social shifts and technological disruptions.