Answer Writing Temp-2 Flashcards
20/06/2022: National Mission on Edible Oils and Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) may be a step towards “atmanirbharta” in palm oil production but its fraught with economic and ecological concerns which need to be addressed. Analyse.: about NMEO-OP?
new national initiative on palm oil production to help increase farm incomes. The scheme involves investment of over Rs 11,000 crore.
Obj
achieve self reliance in edible oil
reducing India’s imports of edible oils from 14MMT in FY22 to 7MMT by FY27
bring in at least 1 million hectare under oil palm by 2025-26
raise domestic production of palm oil by 3X to 11L MT by 2025-26
features
under MoAFW
special emphasis of the scheme will be in India’s north-eastern states and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands due to the conducive weather conditions in the regions.
Under the scheme, oil palm farmers will be provided financial assistance and will get remuneration under a price and viability formula.
scheme subsumes NFSM-Oilseeds and Oilpalm
20/06/2022: National Mission on Edible Oils and Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) may be a step towards “atmanirbharta” in palm oil production but its fraught with economic and ecological concerns which need to be addressed. Analyse.: other initiatives?
Technology Mission on Oilseeds and other policy initiatives have helped India increase the area under oilseeds in India from 9 million tons in 1986 to 32 million tons in 2018-19, though not sufficient to meet the domestic demand.
Several other initiatives like Oil Palm Area Expansion (2011-12) under Rastriya Krishi Vikas Yojana, increasing the minimum support prices of oilseed crops, creation of buffer stock for oilseeds, cluster demonstration of oilseed crops, etc are being implemented
In 1992, the Oil Palm Development Programme (OPDP) was launched
The government also allowed 100 per cent FDI in palm oil plantations
20/06/2022: National Mission on Edible Oils and Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) may be a step towards “atmanirbharta” in palm oil production but its fraught with economic and ecological concerns which need to be addressed. Analyse.: need: India’s dependence o n oil imports?
demand and supply for edible oil in India
each Indian consumed 19.5 kg of edible oil every year on an average during 2015-16, up from 15.8 kg in 2012-13. This amounts to an aggregate demand of around 26 million tons of edible oils per year.
India cultivated oilseeds on 25 million hectare of land, producing 32 million tons of oilseeds in 2018-19, with soybean, rapeseed and mustard and groundnut accounting for almost 90 per cent share in the area. 32 million tons of oilseeds will yield around 8.4 million tons of edible oil.
India’s dependence on edible oil import
India is the world’s biggest vegetable oil importer.
In 2019, India imported around 15 million tons of edible oils worth approximately Rs 7,300 crore, which accounted for 40 per cent of the agricultural imports bill and three per cent of the overall import bill of the country.
Palm oil accounted for the lion’s share of the total imports (62 per cent), followed by soya oil and sunflower oil (21 per cent and 16 per cent, respectively).
India imports about 60% of its edible oil needs, leaving the country’s retail prices vulnerable to international pressures.
20/06/2022: National Mission on Edible Oils and Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) may be a step towards “atmanirbharta” in palm oil production but its fraught with economic and ecological concerns which need to be addressed. Analyse.: need: need for oil palm cultivation specifically?
achieving atmanirbharta in edible oils through traditional oilseeds such as mustard, groundnuts and soya would require an additional area of about 39 million hectares under oilseeds. Such a large tract of land will not be available without cutting down the area under key staples (cereals) which could endanger food security. So, a rational policy option to reduce import dependence in edible oils is to develop oil palm at home and ensure that it gives productivity comparable to that in Indonesia and Malaysia — about four tonnes of oil per hectare, which is more than 10 times mustard can give at existing yields.
advantages of oil palm cultivation
Oil palm yields highest edible oil among the other oil crops.
Farmers can get extra income by intercropping in pre-bearing period of oil palms.
This crop assures monthly income and good market price throughout the year.
Palm is generally the cheapest commodity vegetable oil and also the cheapest oil to produce and refine globally.
Oil palm is among the most productive and profitable of tropical crops for bio fuel production
20/06/2022: National Mission on Edible Oils and Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) may be a step towards “atmanirbharta” in palm oil production but its fraught with economic and ecological concerns which need to be addressed. Analyse.: issues: socio-economic?
Palm oil plantations have stoked conflict between government policies and customary land rights.
Legislation allowing the clearing of tree cover and cutting forests for growing palm trees has led to increasing land-related tussles between government officials, locals and agro-business groups in Malaysia and Indonesia.
The initial state support for such a crop results in a major and quick shift in the existing cropping pattern that are not always in sync with the agro-ecological conditions and food requirements of the region.
eg. Arunachal government’s changing policy on using forestland for palm oil plantations has begun impacting the forest cover as farmers, armed with government incentives, are switching from traditional crops like rice and maize to palm oil.
people in the Northeast do not use the oil for cooking or any other purpose. The oil is being used by industries for packaged food and medicines, detergents and cosmetics
policy also contradicts the government’s commitments under the National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture: “Making agriculture more productive, sustainable, remunerative and climate resilient by promoting location specific integrated/composite farming systems.”
Palm oil cultivation has had a positive impact on poverty eradication in Malaysia, increasing income levels of small and marginal farmers. But, it has also made a sizable number of small landholders vulnerable to variations in global palm oil prices and may of them cntinue to depend on other sources of income. Thus, such an agricultural shift is not self-sustaining and makes local communities vulnerable and exposes them to external factors.
The problem with oil palm is that it is a long gestation period crop. It takes four to six years to come to maturity; during this period, smallholders need to be fully supported.
20/06/2022: National Mission on Edible Oils and Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) may be a step towards “atmanirbharta” in palm oil production but its fraught with economic and ecological concerns which need to be addressed. Analyse.: issues: ecological?
Studies on agrarian change in Southeast Asia have shown that increasing oil palm plantations is a major reason for the region’s declining biodiversity.
Indonesia has seen a loss of 1,15,495 hectares of forest cover in 2020, mainly to oil palm plantation. From 2002-18, Indonesia lost 91,54,000 hectares of its primary forest cover.
Along with adversely impacting the country’s biodiversity, it has led to increasing water pollution.
Palm oil is a water guzzling crop
20/06/2022: National Mission on Edible Oils and Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) may be a step towards “atmanirbharta” in palm oil production but its fraught with economic and ecological concerns which need to be addressed. Analyse.: issues: suggestions?
It takes four to six years to come to maturity; during this period, smallholders need to be fully supported. The support (subsidy) could be the opportunity cost of their lands, say profits from paddy cultivation, which is largely the crop oil palm will replace in coastal and upland areas of Andhra, Telangana and Northeast India.
Based on a rough estimate, 3.6 million tons of additional oils can be produced by means of bridging the yield gap, assuming 1.5 tons per ha as a realizable yield. This requires the wide scale adoption of improved agricultural technologies like quality seeds, optimum use of agro-chemicals and better management.
Improved varieties like Pusa 12, JS 20-34 of soybean, PUSA-0030 and 0031 of mustard which are low erucic acid as well as high yielding, newer, location specific improved varieties like Kadiri-6, Chattisghar Mungfali 1 (CGM 1) are released for cultivation.
Farmers need to be made aware about these newer varieties and provided with access to good quality seeds. Cluster demonstrations and other extension activities in this line can be promoted.
India can also think of expanding the area under oilseed crops by utilising fallow land. India has 11.7 mha of rice fallow, which can be used for the cultivation of safflower and mustard crops, which don’t need much water.
Alternatives such as rice bran oil is gaining popularity amongst the urban consumers, as it is known to reduce the risk of heart diseases and type 2 diabetes. Around 2 million tons of edible oil can be produced using the available rice bran.
Cotton seed is also a promising source of vegetable oil and has an untapped potential. Approximately 1.4 Mt of oil can be augmented with cotton seeds.
India will gain by having a stable export-import policy.
20/06/2022: In what ways can the science, innovation, and research & development (SIRD) be given an impetus in the country? Discuss the role that ‘petty patents’ can play in this regard.: status of GIRD in India?
India’s rank of 46 in WIPO’s Global Innovation Index (GII) 2021, up from 81 in 2015
This finding corroborates an earlier one by UNCTAD in its Digital Economy Report 2021 where India was seen as exceeding expectations.
China occupies the 12th rank in GII, ahead of Japan at 13th. This shows that it is possible to move up the ladder with sustained effort.
The Gross domestic expenditure on R&D (GERD) as % of GDP is 0.7%
India is a low spender (only 0.66% of the GDP) in comparison to the developed countries and emerging economic powers of East Asia. In fact, India’s expenditure on R&D is lower than Low and Middle Income Countries.
the same among other developing BRICS countries was Brazil 1.3%, Russian Federation 1.1%, China 2.1% and South Africa 0.8%.
In most of the developed capitalist countries, defense-related R&D is undertaken by the private sector. In India, this expenditure is mostly borne by public funding.
According to a report (2020) prepared by the Department of Science and Technology (DST); of the funding allocated to R&D in 2017-18, 61.4% of the amount went to DRDO (31.6%), Departments of Space (19%) and Atomic Energy (10.8%) together. Approximately 37% was allocated to the general R&D agencies like the ICAR, CSIR, DST, DBT, ICMR etc. while only 0.9% was allocated to R&D in electronics, IT and renewable energy.
Budget 2022-23
defense R&D will be opened for industry, start-ups, and academia with 25% of the defense budget earmarked for such activities.
identification of sunrise opportunities in areas like artificial intelligence, geospatial systems and drones, semiconductors, space, genomics and pharmaceuticals, green energy, and clean mobility systems.
The percentage share of Private Sector in National R&D expenditure has increased from 32.1% in 2010-11 to 36.8% in 2017-18.
In the Institutional Sector, excluding Higher Education Sector, about 23.9% of the total expenditure was spent on basic research, 36.9% on applied research, 32.4% on experimental development and rest 6.8% on supporting activities.
Industrial Sector spent Rs. 47,109.13 crore on R&D activities and accounted for 41.4% of National R&D expenditure during 2017-18.
India’s per capita R&D expenditure has increased to PPP $ 47.2 in 2017-18 from PPP $ 29.2 in 2007-08.
India’s significant increase in research output is reflected in publication databases: by 50% from 90,864 in 2011 to 1,36,238 in 2016 in SCOPUS; by 36.5% from 47,081 in 2011 to 64,267 in 2016 in SCI; and by 83.1% from 74,143 in 2011 to 1,35,788 in 2018 in NSF.
India’s growth rate of scientific publication during 2011–2016 as per the SCOPUS and SCI database was 8.4% and 6.4% as against the world average of 1.9% and 3.7%
India was ranked at 3rd, 5th and 9th in scientific publication output during 2018 as per the NSF, SCOPUS and SCI database respectively. India is ranked ahead of many developed and developing countries including BRICS except China.
Patents:
According to WIPO, India’s Patent Office stands at the 7th position among the top 10 Patent Filing Offices in the world
The patent filings by Indian enterprises and other institutions have increased from 8,841 in 2011 to 23,141 in 2020 (WIPO), However, patents granted have been only 776 and 4,988 respectively.
Patent applications filed in India are dominated by disciplines like Mechanical, Chemical, Computer/Electronics, and Communication.
Filing of patents have increased from 42763 in 2014-15 to 66440 in 2021-22, more that 50% increase in a span of 7 years
Nearly five times increase in grant of patents in 2021-22 (30,074) as compared to 2014-15 (5978)
Reduction in Time of patent examination from 72 months in Dec 2016 to 5-23 months at present, for different technological areas
for the first time in the last 11 years, the number of domestic patent filing has surpassed the number of international patent filing at Indian patent office in the Quarter Jan-Mar 2022
Research resources
3rd in the number of Ph.D. in science & engineering. The number of researchers per million population has doubled since 2000.
Women participation in extramural R&D projects has increased significantly to 24% in 2016-17 from 13% in 2000-01 due to various initiatives undertaken by the Government in S&T sector
Number of researchers per million population in India has increased to 255 in 2017 from 218 in 2015 and 110 in 2000.
20/06/2022: In what ways can the science, innovation, and research & development (SIRD) be given an impetus in the country? Discuss the role that ‘petty patents’ can play in this regard.: significance of GIRD in India?
productivity and economic growth
R&D helps in development of new technologies, or improving the efficiency of existing processes (like enhancing resource use efficiency).
low cost indigenous solutions
to create tailor made solutions for the Indian population; such solutions that are cost effective and easily accessible to the poor sections like the Jaipur Foot.
improve learning outcomes
best teaching and learning process at the higher education level occurs in environments where there is a strong culture of research and knowledge creation. This is testified from the experience of the world’s best universities like the Harvard, Stanford, Oxford etc.
reducing imports
tackling emergencies
A case in point is creation of Covishield vaccine by the Serum Institute in partnership with Oxford University and Astrazeneca company. In addition, Covaxin was developed indigenously in India through the partnership of ICMR and National Institute of Virology with Bharat Biotech, a private sector corporation.
national security
Experts have raised caution against the use of semiconductor chips imported from China. Further India is still one of the largest defense importers of the world as per data of Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
Climate change mitigation and adaptation
20/06/2022: In what ways can the science, innovation, and research & development (SIRD) be given an impetus in the country? Discuss the role that ‘petty patents’ can play in this regard.: initiatives?
National Research Foundation
Prime Minister’s Research Fellows (PMRF) Schem
IMPRINT Initiative focuses on socially relevant research in higher educational institutions
Atal tinkering Labs
Uchhatar Avishkar Yojana (UAY), which promotes industry sponsored, outcome-oriented research
Establishment of 9 research parks in IITs and IISc
20/06/2022: In what ways can the science, innovation, and research & development (SIRD) be given an impetus in the country? Discuss the role that ‘petty patents’ can play in this regard.: petty patents: what?
patent system fails to encourage minor innovations since the criteria for inventiveness tend to look at the novelty of the invention.
The experience of several East Asian countries suggests that petty patents and industrial design patents could be effective means of encouraging domestic enterprises to undertake minor adaptive innovations and foster an innovation-based rivalry among them.
India should consider adopting a petty patents regime that provides limited protection to minor incremental innovations made, especially those by MSMEs, often called jugaad.
The utility models or petty patents typically provide a limited period of protection (5-10 years in contrast to 20 years in case of patents) and have less stringent requirements and procedures.
20/06/2022: In what ways can the science, innovation, and research & development (SIRD) be given an impetus in the country? Discuss the role that ‘petty patents’ can play in this regard.: petty patents: difference betn petty patents and patents?
requirements for acquiring utility models are less stringent than for patents. While the requirement of “novelty” is always to be met, albeit some countries only on a local level, that of “inventive step” or “non-obviousness” may be lower or absent altogether. In practice, protection for utility models is often sought for innovations of a rather incremental character which may not meet the patentability criteria.
term of protection for utility models is shorter than for patents, and varies from country to country (usually between 6 and 15 years).
registration process is often simpler and faster, sometimes taking six months or less.
20/06/2022: In what ways can the science, innovation, and research & development (SIRD) be given an impetus in the country? Discuss the role that ‘petty patents’ can play in this regard.: petty patents: role in promoting SIRD?
circumvent stringent requirements of patent system
boost to MSMEs which often do not have capital or manpower for fullfledged R&D division
Incentivising minor and incremental innovations through limited protection under utility models will help to foster the innovation rivalries among firms, particularly MSMEs, paving the way for more significant innovations by them in the future.
20/06/2022: In what ways can the science, innovation, and research & development (SIRD) be given an impetus in the country? Discuss the role that ‘petty patents’ can play in this regard.: suggestions?
gross R&D expenditure (GERD) as a percentage of GDP at 0.7% is low. It needs to rise to upwards of 2% of GDP, as in the leading innovative nations.
only about 30% of the GERD is spent by business enterprises, despite the generous tax incentives offered by the government. This suggests that Indian enterprises have not got into an R&D culture, not to talk of innovative rivalry. The bulk of innovative activity is conducted by a handful of companies in the pharma and auto sectors.
In India, R&D activities have been encouraged mainly through weighted tax deductions. Partial funding for specific R&D projects undertaken by business enterprises may be desirable to develop products or processes, thus strengthening competitiveness. governments in developed countries spend billions of dollars on R&D subsidies given to national enterprises to shore up their competitiveness. Subsidies up to 50% of project costs have been made non-actionable under the World Trade Organization rules.
Funding support for R&D activity of business enterprises may help to direct it to a desirable direction or field. For instance, it may be used to promote capability building for new products, process innovations for local or global markets, focus on enhancing ecological sustainability, promote industry’s linkage with public-funded research laboratories and universities, and so on.
Besides, products based on indigenously developed technology could be given production tax concessions (such as those extended to small-scale industry products) and income tax concessions (such as those enjoyed by export turnover) to encourage innovation.
Although the ratio of applications to grants of patents has gone up over the years, many patent applications fail to satisfy the three-pronged test of novelty, inventive step and utility. In that context, another policy to promote local innovation could be to protect minor innovations through the so-called utility models or petty patents, as has been done by several East Asian countries.
20/06/2022: What is ‘critical information infrastructure’? There is a need for a more integrated and strategic approach to securing critical information infrastructure, as they are so crucial to the economic, social and political wellbeing of the country. Examine. : intro?
Information Technology Act of 2000 defines “Critical Information Infrastructure” as a “computer resource, the incapacitation or destruction of which shall have debilitating impact on national security, economy, public health or safety”.
The government, under the Act, has the power to declare any data, database, IT network or communications infrastructure as CII to protect that digital asset.
Any person who secures access or attempts to secure access to a protected system in violation of the law can be punished with a jail term of up to 10 years.
