Current Affairs Quiz - July, 2020

Notes:
An online tool named ‘Clean air counter’ has been launched by major environmental groups, which calculates the economic impact of air pollution, by measuring smog in 28 major global cities.
As per the tool, New Delhi has suffered a maximum loss of 25,000 lives due to air pollution, measured on a per capita basis. It has also lost 5.8% of its total GDP, from January to June 2020. While Shanghai lost 27000 lives, Beijing lost 22000 lives.

Notes:
The Indian Space Research and Research Organisation (ISRO) is set to launch Brazil’s Amazonia -1 satellite onboard PSLV.
This satellite has been designed, assembled and tested in Brazil and it will be the first Earth Observation satellite. The launch of the PSLV is scheduled to be held next month while the date is to be released by ISRO soon.

Notes:
As per the official broadcasting service of Pakistan, the country’s mission to the United Nations has confirmed its bid to seek another term in the United Nations Human Rights Council.
Pakistan is to contest one of the four seats reserved for the Group of Asia Pacific countries for the 2021- 23 term. Pakistan was also a founding member of the UNHRC when it was founded in the year 2006.

Notes:
The Chinese embassy in the central Asian country Kazakhstan has recently issued a statement, in which it has warned its citizens living in Kazakhstan, about a local ‘unknown pneumonia’.
The embassy also announced that this unknown disease has a higher fatality rate than the Covid-19 disease. As per the statement, the disease has caused 1772 deaths in the first six months of the year, which also included several Chinese citizens.

Notes:
‘India Cycles4Change Challenge’ is a new initiative of the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, under its Smart Cities Mission.
The Ministry has recently opened the registration for the Challenge, which was originally launched on June 25, 2020. All cities under the Smart Cities Mission, capital cities of States/UTs and all cities with above 5 lakh population can apply through the newly launched portal and provide quick solutions for promoting cycling.

Notes:
Union Home Minister Amit Shah has recently launched the nationwide tree plantation drive of the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF).
Under this nationwide drive, Jawans of Central Armed Police Forces plated saplings in Chhattisgarh. The personnel of CAPF’s child agencies: BSF, CRPF, ITBP and CISF also planted saplings in their campuses. CAPFs have fixed a target of planting more than 1.35 crore saplings by this month.

Notes:
India’s oldest apex industry body Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI) has projected India’s annual median GDP growth for 2020-21 at -4.5%.
This has been projected in the association’s Economic Outlook Survey in the SBI Banking and Economics Conclave. It had previously predicted India’s growth rate to be 5.5 per cent in the January 2020 survey. In the conclave, RBI Governor said that Indian economy has started showing signs of getting back to normalcy.

Notes:
The flagship initiative of NITI Aayog, Atal Innovation Mission, (AIM) has launched a programme named ‘Demo-Days’.
The programme aims to identify start-ups with potential Covid-19 innovations and help them develop their ideas into workable solutions which will be deployed across the country. This was launched in partnership with other state-owned bodies including BIRAC, DBT, DST, Start-up India etc.

Notes:
The CMD of Reliance Industries Limited (RIL), Mukesh Ambani announced at the annual general meeting, that Jio platforms and Google will jointly develop a new Android-based smartphone system.
An entry level affordable smart phone by optimising the Android operating system would be jointly developed by the two giants. Google also announced that it will invest Rs 33,737 crores in Jio for developing 5G technology.

Notes:
The 15th summit between the India and the European Union was held recently through a virtual mode. India was represented by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The EU was represented by Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission and Charles Michel, President of the European Council. The leaders adopted the “India-EU Strategic Partnership: A Roadmap to 2025”, a strategic guide for mutual cooperation, over the next five years.