INTEGRATED MAINS AND PRELIMS MENTORSHIP (IMPM) 2025 Daily KEY
| Exclusive for Subscribers Daily: Loss and Damage Found (LDF) for the UPSC Exam? Why are topics like Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) and Consumer Price Index (CPI) important for both preliminary and main exams? Discover more insights in the UPSC Exam Notes for December 28, 2024 |
🚨 UPSC EXAM NOTES presents the December edition of our comprehensive monthly guide. Access it to enhance your preparation. We value your input - share your thoughts and recommendations in the comments section or via email at Support@upscexamnotes.com 🚨
Critical Topics and Their Significance for the UPSC CSE Examination on December 28, 2024
Daily Insights and Initiatives for UPSC Exam Notes: Comprehensive explanations and high-quality material provided regularly for students
The Loss and Damage Fund is a financial mechanism established to help developing countries cope with the adverse impacts of climate change. It was created as part of international climate negotiations, specifically under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), to provide compensation for losses and damages caused by climate-related disasters such as floods, storms, sea-level rise, and other extreme events.
The fund aims to address the consequences that are beyond the capacity of countries to adapt to, especially in vulnerable nations that contribute the least to global emissions but are disproportionately affected by climate change. The Loss and Damage Fund became a key outcome of the COP27 climate conference in 2022, where developed countries agreed to contribute financial resources to support this effort.
This fund acknowledges that even with mitigation and adaptation efforts, certain damages from climate change are inevitable and need to be addressed through financial aid.
More Information
India has played a significant role in advocating for the establishment of the Loss and Damage Fund to address the impacts of climate change on vulnerable nations. As a developing country and a key player in global climate negotiations, India has consistently highlighted the need for a fair and equitable approach to climate finance, with an emphasis on the principle of "common but differentiated responsibilities" (CBDR). This principle underscores that while all countries must act on climate change, developed nations, which have historically contributed the most to global emissions, should take greater responsibility in financing climate-related losses and damages.
Key aspects of India's role in the Loss and Damage Fund:
-
Advocacy for Climate Justice: India has been vocal about the importance of climate justice, emphasizing that developing countries, which are the least responsible for global warming, should not bear the brunt of its impacts. India has consistently pushed for financial assistance to help vulnerable countries cope with irreversible losses from climate disasters.
-
Supporting the Vulnerable: Although India itself faces significant climate risks, it has also supported the cause of smaller, more vulnerable nations, such as small island developing states (SIDS) and least developed countries (LDCs), that are at the frontline of climate change impacts. At COP27, India aligned with other developing nations in advocating for the creation of a Loss and Damage Fund to address the needs of these countries.
-
Balanced Approach: While supporting the Loss and Damage Fund, India has also stressed the need for a balanced approach in climate negotiations, which should not detract from the importance of mitigation and adaptation efforts. India emphasizes that the Loss and Damage mechanism should complement, rather than replace, efforts to reduce emissions and invest in adaptation strategies.
-
Focus on Implementation: After the Loss and Damage Fund was agreed upon at COP27 in 2022, India has continued to focus on the implementation phase. India calls for transparency and clarity in how the fund will be structured, governed, and financed, with a clear distinction between contributions from developed countries and developing nations
Follow Up Question
1.Explain the purpose of the Green Grid Initiative launched at World Leaders Summit of the COP26 UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow in November, 2021. When was this idea first floated in the International Solar Alliance (ISA)? (2021)
2.Describe the major outcomes of the 26th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). What are the commitments made by India in this conference? (2021)
What can CAQM do to improve Delhi air?
For Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance
For Mains Examination: GS III - Environment & Ecology
Context:
CAQM Sub-Committee on GRAP revokes Stage-III of revised GRAP in the entire NCR with immediate effect. All actions under Stages II & I of revised GRAP shall however remain invoked and be implemented, intensified, monitored and reviewed by all agencies concerned in the entire NCR to ensure that the AQI levels do not rise further in the coming days
Read about:
What is Air Quality Index (AQI)?
Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM)
Key takeaways:
Air Pollution in Delhi
Delhi's air quality has been in the "severe" or "severe plus" category for most of the last ten days. This led to the Supreme Court criticizing the Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) for its ineffective response to the ongoing pollution crisis.
What is CAQM?
The Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) was established through an ordinance in 2020, later formalized by an Act of Parliament in 2021. It was designed to address air pollution issues in the National Capital Region (NCR) and neighboring areas through coordination, research, and resolution. Initially comprising 15 members, including government officials and NGO representatives, it has now expanded to 27 members under the leadership of Rajesh Verma.
The CAQM replaced the Environmental Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority (EPCA), which had been formed in 1998 by the Supreme Court. Unlike EPCA, the CAQM operates under statutory backing, allowing it to enforce actions more robustly. Measures such as the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP), initially introduced by EPCA, continue to be implemented by the CAQM to combat pollution.
Powers of CAQM
Under the Commission for Air Quality Management Act, 2021, the CAQM is empowered to:
- Formulate and enforce measures to protect and enhance air quality.
- Issue directions and entertain complaints.
- Take stringent action against officials failing to comply with its orders (as per Section 14).
Supreme Court's Criticism of CAQM
The Supreme Court, in its recent observations, expressed dissatisfaction with CAQM's lack of effective enforcement. It highlighted that many stakeholders were not adhering to its directions and noted delays in implementing critical measures under GRAP despite air quality falling to the "severe plus" level. The court urged CAQM to take proactive, impactful steps rather than relying on delayed responses.
Is CAQM Responsible for Delhi’s Pollution?
While CAQM devises policies and coordinates with agencies, the actual implementation of these measures lies with state governments and local authorities. According to a CAQM official, the commission has improved coordination and planning, citing efforts like engaging state officials months ahead of the stubble-burning season to prepare action plans.
Despite these efforts, the official acknowledged challenges, stating that while stubble burning had been a primary focus, future plans would prioritize tackling multiple pollution sources, including dust and vehicular emissions.
Conclusion
While the CAQM has brought a structured approach to combating air pollution, gaps in enforcement and ground-level implementation continue to hamper its effectiveness. Comprehensive and collaborative efforts across all levels of governance are crucial to achieving tangible improvements in air quality
Follow Up Question
- Carbon dioxide
- Carbon monoxide
- Nitrogen dioxide
- Sulfur dioxide
- Methane
Select the correct answer using the code given below:
A. 1, 2 and 3 only
B. 2, 3 and 4 only
C. 1, 4 and 5 only
D. 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5
|
Answer (B)
The Air Quality Index (AQI) in India is calculated based on the concentration of the following pollutants:
Among the gases listed in the question:
|
How inflation affects cost of living?
For Preliminary Examination: Consumer Price Index (CPI), Wholesale Price Index (WPI)
For Mains Examination: GS III - Economy
Context:
Driven by a 10.87 per cent spike in food prices, India’s retail inflation surged to a 14-month high of 6.21 per cent in October this year. While unseasonal rains and extended monsoons in certain parts of the country contributed to the surge in vegetable prices, rising global food and fuel prices due to geopolitical tensions also contributed to domestic inflation.
Read about:
Inflation
Consumer Price Index (CPI)
Wholesale Price Index (WPI)
Key takeaways:
What is Inflation?
Inflation is the rate at which the overall price level of goods and services rises over time, leading to a reduction in the purchasing power of money or real income. Simply put, as inflation increases, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and services than before.
Rising inflation has a significant impact on households, particularly those with fixed or lower incomes. As the prices of goods and services increase, the same nominal income can buy fewer items, thus raising the cost of living.
Understanding Nominal and Real Income
Nominal income refers to the total monetary earnings of an individual, household, or entity over a given period. For example, if someone earns ₹50,000 per month, this is their nominal income. However, as inflation rises, the real value of this amount diminishes.
Real income, on the other hand, represents the actual purchasing power of nominal income after accounting for inflation. It can be calculated using the formula:
Real Income = Nominal Income ÷ Price of Goods
Real Interest Rates and Inflation
Inflation also affects real interest rates, which are derived by subtracting the inflation rate from the nominal interest rate. For example, if the nominal interest rate is 10% and inflation is 8%, the real interest rate would be 2%.
Real Interest Rate = Nominal Interest Rate − Inflation Rate
When inflation rises, real interest rates decrease, potentially discouraging savings, as the real value of money grows at a slower pace.
Measuring Inflation
Several methods are used to measure inflation, each focusing on different aspects of price changes:
Consumer Price Index (CPI)
CPI measures changes in the general price level of goods and services purchased by households, including both domestically produced and imported items. Published monthly by the government, CPI reflects the inflation experienced by consumers. The formula for calculating inflation is:
Inflation Rate = ((CPI x+1 − CPI x ) / CPI x) × 100
Here, CPI x refers to the base year’s CPI value. Annual inflation rates are determined by comparing the current month’s CPI with that of the same month in the previous year. In India, the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) calculates and publishes CPI data at both national and state levels.
Wholesale Price Index (WPI)
While CPI reflects retail price changes, WPI measures wholesale market price changes for goods. It tracks the inflation rate across 697 bulk commodities but excludes the cost of services like haircuts or banking transactions, which are included in CPI.
For example, the WPI inflation rate for October 2024 in India was 2.36%, while the CPI inflation rate for the same period was 6.21%, highlighting differences in their scope and calculation.
GDP Deflator
The GDP deflator measures inflation by tracking changes in the prices of all domestically produced goods and services. It is calculated using the formula:
GDP Deflator = (Nominal GDP ÷ Real GDP) × 100
Unlike CPI, the GDP deflator includes all goods and services produced domestically but excludes imports, making it a comprehensive measure of inflation.
Producer Price Index (PPI)
PPI captures the average price changes received by producers for their goods and services. Unlike CPI, it focuses on prices from the producer’s perspective, excluding taxes, transport costs, and trade margins.
Wage Inflation
Wage inflation measures the rate at which wages increase over time, reflecting changes in labor market dynamics. Labor unions often negotiate wage hikes based on expected inflation to ensure a positive real wage increase. For instance, if inflation is projected at 2%, unions may push for a wage hike exceeding 2% to maintain workers' purchasing power
Follow Up Question
|
Answer (C)
|
How global warming affects forecasting?
For Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance
For Mains Examination: GS III - Environment & ecology
Context:
Existing models cannot reproduce monsoon trends in the past half century and are considered unreliable for the future. Meteorologists will need to figure out if the predictability of natural modes such as hurricanes, El Niño, La Niña, and the Indian Ocean Dipole will decrease as the warming is relentless, if not accelerating
Read about:
What is global warming?
Global warming and it's effects
Key takeaways:
- The record-breaking warming witnessed in 2023-2024 offers a more vivid understanding of the impacts of global warming. This period has been marked by a series of extreme weather events across the globe, including intense heatwaves, powerful cyclones, severe floods, droughts, and widespread wildfires.
- Some estimates suggest that the world has already surpassed the 1.5º C warming mark, meaning that the earth's average surface temperature has risen over 1.5º C compared to pre-industrial levels. It's important to note that these global temperatures are based on a combination of actual data and climate modeling.
- Since the 1.5º C threshold is a key concern for the Alliance of Small Island Developing States, scientists have developed models to forecast the environmental disruptions that exceeding this limit could cause.
- However, there's still uncertainty about how long temperatures need to remain above this level for the expected effects to fully unfold.
- The extreme weather patterns seen in 2023-2024 also serve as a stark reminder of how challenging it is to predict weather and climate with the precision and detail necessary for effective disaster management. Unfortunately, loss of life, damage to property, and destruction of infrastructure continue to disproportionately affect vulnerable communities, especially those in poverty.
2024 Predictions and Realities
- While meteorologists correctly anticipated the 2023 El Niño in the spring, the intensity of warming in 2023-2024 exceeded expectations. Factors such as water vapor from the 2022 Hunga Tonga–Hunga Ha‘apai underwater volcanic eruption and carbon dioxide from wildfires may have intensified this warming.
- The 2023 monsoon was below average but didn't qualify as an El Niño drought, which researchers are still trying to understand. Forecasts that predicted a strong La Niña in late 2024 seem less likely to materialize, and other weather patterns, such as the cyclone season, have also behaved differently from expectations.
- This isn't merely a critique of prediction models but rather a call for caution and learning from this period of extraordinary warming. We must understand its implications for future forecasts and climate projections.
Challenges of Predicting the Climate
- The often-quoted saying, “Prediction is difficult, especially about the future,” holds true, especially in weather and climate forecasting. Despite improvements in models and observation networks, global warming might make predictions even more challenging. Are the unexpected weather patterns of this year an anomaly, or do they signal what lies ahead?
- Numerous studies have explored the effects of warming on natural phenomena such as hurricanes, monsoons, and El Niños. However, if the earth has already warmed beyond 1.5º C, can we draw any clear conclusions about how these patterns have adapted so far?
- Unfortunately, the recent warming hasn't lasted long enough for us to identify significant shifts in dominant climate trends confidently. While climate models are proficient at simulating natural patterns based on solar energy, they aren't flawless, often producing inconsistent results.
- For instance, current models struggle to accurately replicate monsoon trends over the past fifty years and remain unreliable for predicting future trends. This limitation highlights the need to address whether monsoon patterns fluctuate by decade or indicate genuine trends influenced by climate change.
The Future of Climate Predictions
While there’s optimism for the advancement of climate predictions, relying solely on hope isn’t a strategy. It’s crucial to enhance models and acknowledge their existing strengths despite certain shortcomings. We must determine whether the predictability of natural events like hurricanes and El Niños will diminish as warming accelerates. Researchers are working tirelessly to refine models, data networks, and technologies, including AI, to tackle this challenge.
There’s cause for optimism regarding more reliable and actionable early warnings on a local scale.
Lessons from 2023
Climate projections are currently based on models that factor in emissions, population growth, and mitigation strategies. For the next couple of decades, uncertainties in projections will stem from model limitations and natural climate variability. Beyond this period, uncertainties will primarily depend on hypothetical scenarios.
The challenge of capturing the influence of warming on natural patterns will continue to pose a problem for long-term climate projections. Focusing on improving weather and climate predictions is essential to refine these models. The most reliable approach might be to limit our projections to just a decade or two ahead, given the difficulty of predicting geopolitical, economic, and societal changes over a more extended timeframe
Follow Up Question
|
Answer (B)
|
Earth whistles when lightning strikes, and there’s a new melody
For Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance
For Mains Examination: GS III - Science & technology
Context:
The earth is surrounded by a bubble-shaped magnetic field that shields the planet from radiation from the Sun and other celestial objects. This field is called the earth’s magnetosphere.
Read about:
What is Lightning?
Is Lighting is reason for more Wildfires?
Key takeaways:
- The Earth is encased in a bubble-shaped magnetic field known as the magnetosphere, which protects the planet from harmful radiation emitted by the Sun and other celestial bodies.
- During a solar storm, the Sun releases charged particles with higher energy levels into the surrounding space. Without the magnetosphere, these particles could have made life on Earth impossible.
- However, the magnetosphere traps these particles, causing them to circulate around the Earth instead of reaching the surface. They form two large, doughnut-shaped radiation belts in the upper atmosphere, known as the Van Allen radiation belts.
- These belts were discovered by American astrophysicist James Van Allen in 1958, and his research played a crucial role in enabling human space exploration, including the mission to the Moon. Van Allen observed that certain areas of the radiation belts were weaker, suggesting that passing through these regions would be less harmful to astronauts and spacecraft.
- Lightning generates a bolt of electrical energy that travels through the atmosphere, releasing electromagnetic waves with varying frequencies. Some of these waves are guided by Earth's magnetic field into a layer of ionized gas above the atmosphere, where they move along magnetic field lines between the Earth's northern and southern hemispheres. The speed of these waves increases with their frequency, sometimes reaching up to a tenth of the speed of light.
- Many of these waves fall within the range of human hearing (20–20,000 Hz) and can be detected as whistling sounds using a receiver. As lower frequency waves travel, they can lose some energy in the upper atmosphere, resulting in a descending tone.
- In a study published in the journal Science Advances on August 16, researchers from the University of Alaska Fairbanks identified a new type of whistler wave created by an unfamiliar wave generation process.
- They found that lightning energy injected into the ionosphere at low latitudes could be reflected into the magnetosphere, contradicting previous beliefs that such energy could not escape the ionosphere at low latitudes.
- This discovery is significant because it suggests that the amount of lightning energy entering the magnetosphere could be double what was previously estimated, potentially leading to revised calculations of lightning's impact on the Van Allen radiation belts
Follow Up Question
|
Answer (D)
Thunder is produced by the rapid expansion of air due to the intense heat generated by lightning. When lightning strikes, it heats the air surrounding its path to an extremely high temperature, causing the air to expand rapidly. This rapid expansion creates a shock wave that we hear as thunder. None of the options provided correctly describes the cause of thunder
|
| Subject | Topic | Description |
| History | Modern Indian History | Important Personalities |
| History | Modern Indian History | Independence and Partition |
| History | Modern Indian History | Constitutional Development in India |
| History | Modern Indian History | Peasants, Tribal and other movements |
|
UPSC EXAM NOTES will be conducting both Prelims and Mains exams every Sunday as part of the Integrated Mains and Prelims (IMPM) Program. This program provides a comprehensive approach to UPSC exam preparation, ensuring that candidates are well-prepared for both stages of the exam. Program Highlights:
Duration: The IMPM plan is a one-year program, ensuring continuous and structured preparation over 12 months. With regular testing and consistent study guidance, this program is designed to maximize your chances of success in the UPSC exams |