Current Affairs Quiz - January 2022

Notes:
Government of Malaysia and Global Tiger Forum (GTF) jointly organised the 4th Asia Ministerial Conference on Tiger Conservation.
India’s Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change Bhupender Yadav delivered India’s statement at the Conference on Tiger Conservation. India will facilitate Tiger Range Countries towards finalisation of New Delhi declaration for Global Tiger Summit to be held in Russia.

Notes:
NITI Aayog, Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI), and RMI India released a report, titled ‘Banking on Electric Vehicles in India’.
It highlighted the importance of priority-sector recognition for retail lending in the electric vehicle sector.  The report also provided recommendations to inform the inclusion of EVs in the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI’s) priority-sector lending (PSL) guidelines.

Notes:
The ‘Living Root Bridges’ are found in Meghalaya. They are made from rubber tree roots, known as ‘Ficus elastica’ tree and their tangled roots provides a stable alternative to wooden bridges.
Recently, the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) has underlined some green rules for the living root bridges to get the UNESCO World Heritage Site tag. Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma sought UNESCO recognition on its 50th statehood day – January 21.

Notes:
The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) implemented 3-D Virtual Diplomacy. Members of the UNSC went on a virtual field trip to Columbia, as they watched Columbia with the help of Virtual Reality (VR) technology.
This is the first-ever Security Council session to use a virtual reality, to use innovative solutions to understand peacekeeping and peace-building.

Notes:
The ‘Contingency Fund of India’ is held by the Finance Ministry’s Department of economic affairs on behalf of the President of India.
It can be operated by executive action and used during disasters and related unforeseen expenditures. Recently, the Government has tweaked spending norms for Contingency Fund, allowing 40 per cent of the total corpus to be placed at disposal of the expenditure secretary.

Notes:
Himachal Pradesh is the northernmost state of India and shares borders with the union territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh to the north.
The state is celebrating its 52nd full statehood day on 25 January, as it was formed as the 18^th Indian state on the same day in 1971, with Dr. Yashwant Singh Parmar as its first Chief Minister. In 1950, Himachal became a Part ‘C’ state then became a union territory in 1956.

Notes:
The Government approved the plan for the amalgamation of the Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative Bank (PMC Bank) with Unity Small Finance Bank (USFBL).
USFBL is a joint venture between Centrum Financial services and digital payments platform BharatPe. All the branches of the PMC Bank will function as branches of USFBL with immediate effect.

Notes:
The scientific team at CSIR-CDRI, Lucknow along with their industry partner Biotech Desk have successfully developed the indigenous RTPCR Kit INDICoV-OmTM for specific detection of the Omicron variant.
Most of the RT-PCR-based diagnostic kits do not confirm whether Covid infection is caused by the Omicron variant. Also various current Omicron tests have several limitations.

Notes:
Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs (MoHUA) launched the Swachhata Start-Up Challenge to encourage innovative start-ups to transform the sanitation and waste management sector.
The challenge has been launched in partnership with Department of Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) and Agence Française de Développement (AFD). It seeks to promote enterprise development under Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban 2.0 (SBM-U 2.0).

Notes:
The 2022 Winter Olympics, officially the XXIV Olympic Winter Games is scheduled to take place from 4 to 20 February 2022 in Beijing and its neighbouring town in China.
A report released by Sport Ecology Group and Save Our Winters has stated the dangers of artificial snow to be produced in the Olympics on athletes’ bodies. It also warned on water wastage that happens for the snow at these games.