Australia’s Great Barrier Reef , a third of coral killed due to bleaching
Mass bleaching has killed more than a third of the coral in the northern and central parts of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, though corals to the south have escaped with little damage.
Researchers who conducted months of aerial and underwater surveys of the 2,300-kilometre reef off Australia’s east coast found that around 35 per cent of the coral in the northern and central sections of the reef are dead or dying.
And some parts of the reef had lost more than half of the coral to bleaching.
The extent of the damage, which has occurred in just the past couple of months, has serious implications.
Though bleached corals that haven’t died can recover if the water temperature drops, older corals take longer to bounce back and likely won’t have a chance to recover before the next bleaching event occurs. Coral that has died is gone for good, which affects other creatures that rely on it for food and shelter.
The damage is part of a massive bleaching event that has been impacting reefs around the world for the past two years.
Experts say the bleaching has been triggered by global warming and El Nino, a warming of parts of the Pacific Ocean that changes weather worldwide.
Hot water puts stress on coral, causing it to turn white and become vulnerable to disease. Other reefs have suffered even more severely from the recent bleaching; Some Pacific islands, for example, have reported over 80 per cent coral death rates.
This is the third and most extreme mass bleaching event in 18 years to strike the Great Barrier Reef, and in each case, the areas that suffered the worst bleaching were the areas where the water was hottest for the longest period of time, Hughes said.
This time, the southern half of the reef was spared largely due to a lucky break that arrived in the form of a tropical cyclone.
The remnants of the storm which had lashed the South Pacific brought cloud cover and heavy rains to the region, cooling the ocean enough to stop bleaching that had just begun in the south. About 95 per cent of the coral in the southern portion of the reef has survived.
India & USA Signs MoU To Enhance Cooperation on Energy Security, Clean Energy & Climate Change
The objective of the MoU is to enhance cooperation on energy security, clean energy and climate change through increased bilateral engagement and further joint initiatives for promoting sustainable growth. These activities are intended to increase incentives for innovation including research and development, and voluntary and mutually-agreed technology transfer, as well as the deployment of clean energy technologies in both countries; contribute to a global effort to curb the rise in greenhouse gas emissions; and enhance resilience to the impacts of climate change.
The Priority initiatives under the MoU would be:
a. US-India Energy smart Cities Partnership
b. Greening the Grid.
c. Promoting Energy Access through Clean Energy (PEACE) expansion
d. Energy Efficiency including space cooling
e. Renewable energy.
f. Energy security.
g. Clean energy finance
h. U.S-India partnership for Climate Resilience
i. Air quality
j. Forestry, Landscapes and REDD+
k. Fellowships
l. Accelerating innovation on clean energy and climate change
REDD+
Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD) is a mechanism that has been under negotiation by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) since 2005, with the objective of mitigating climate change through reducing net emissions of greenhouse gases through enhanced forest management in developing countries.
Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD) is an effort to create a financial value for the carbon stored in forests, offering incentives for developing countries to reduce emissions from forested lands and invest in low-carbon paths to sustainable development. “REDD+” goes beyond deforestation and forest degradation, and includes the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks
Railways to stop footing bill on passenger travel concessions
The cash-strapped Indian Railways has decided to stop footing the bill for myriad passenger travel concessions.Railway provides more than 50 concessions as a part of social service obligation, incurring huge losses every year. It is not that concessions shouldn’t be extended to the needy but the concerned ministries should be reimbursing railway for the burden of these concessions.
Every year, Indian Railways loses about Rs.1,500 crore in providing 53 such concessions, including those for senior citizens, differently-abled and patients.
Senior citizens
According to the Railway Ministry, the financial burden should be borne by the ministries concerned such as social justice for senior citizens, home affairs for freedom fighters and so on.The Parliamentary Affairs Ministry already pays the full ticket fares for Members of Parliament travelling on railway concession passes, for instance.
Of the total loss of Rs.1,500 crore on passenger fare concessions, the largest chunk of about Rs.1,000 crore is accounted for by subsidies for senior citizens.
While male senior citizens can avail 40 per cent reduction on ticket fares, female passengers get 50 per cent discount.
This concession is provided across all passenger classes and trains, including in services like Rajdhani, Shatabdi, Jan Shatabdi and Duronto.
Coaching services
In 2015-16, the loss on coaching services, including suburban and non-suburban passenger traffic, luggage and parcels stood at Rs.34,030 crore.
Further, the Railways spent Rs.76 crore for carrying essential commodities such as fruits and vegetables at below cost in a bid to contain their prices.
This is no more sustainable. The revenue from passenger segment is around Rs.45,000 crore and railway incurs around Rs.34,000 crore as losses towards social service obligations.
Facts:-
- Chidambaranar Port has bagged National Award for Excellence in Cost Management for the year 2015
- World’s Longest Rail Tunnel. Gotthard base tunnel (57 Km) will provide a high-speed rail link under the Swiss Alps between northern and southern Europe. It has overtaken Japan’s 53.9 Km Seikan rail tunnel as the world’s longest tunnel. This will reduce the journey time between Zurich and Milan by an hour
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Petrol in India is cheaper than in countries like Hong Kong, Germany and the UK but costlier than in China, Brazil, Japan, the US, Russia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, a Bank of Baroda Economics Research report showed.
Rising fuel prices in India have led to considerable debate on which government, state or central, should be lowering their taxes to keep prices under control.
The rise in fuel prices is mainly due to the global price of crude oil (raw material for making petrol and diesel) going up. Further, a stronger dollar has added to the cost of crude oil.
Amongst comparable countries (per capita wise), prices in India are higher than those in Vietnam, Kenya, Ukraine, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Venezuela. Countries that are major oil producers have much lower prices.
In the report, the Philippines has a comparable petrol price but has a per capita income higher than India by over 50 per cent.
Countries which have a lower per capita income like Kenya, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and Venezuela have much lower prices of petrol and hence are impacted less than India.
“Therefore there is still a strong case for the government to consider lowering the taxes on fuel to protect the interest of the people,” the report argued.
India is the world’s third-biggest oil consuming and importing nation. It imports 85 per cent of its oil needs and so prices retail fuel at import parity rates.
With the global surge in energy prices, the cost of producing petrol, diesel and other petroleum products also went up for oil companies in India.
They raised petrol and diesel prices by Rs 10 a litre in just over a fortnight beginning March 22 but hit a pause button soon after as the move faced criticism and the opposition parties asked the government to cut taxes instead.
India imports most of its oil from a group of countries called the ‘OPEC +’ (i.e, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Russia, etc), which produces 40% of the world’s crude oil.
As they have the power to dictate fuel supply and prices, their decision of limiting the global supply reduces supply in India, thus raising prices
The government charges about 167% tax (excise) on petrol and 129% on diesel as compared to US (20%), UK (62%), Italy and Germany (65%).
The abominable excise duty is 2/3rd of the cost, and the base price, dealer commission and freight form the rest.
Here is an approximate break-up (in Rs):
a)Base Price | 39 |
b)Freight | 0.34 |
c) Price Charged to Dealers = (a+b) | 39.34 |
d) Excise Duty | 40.17 |
e) Dealer Commission | 4.68 |
f) VAT | 25.35 |
g) Retail Selling Price | 109.54 |
Looked closely, much of the cost of petrol and diesel is due to higher tax rate by govt, specifically excise duty.
So the question is why government is not reducing the prices ?
India, being a developing country, it does require gigantic amount of funding for its infrastructure projects as well as welfare schemes.
However, we as a society is yet to be tax-compliant. Many people evade the direct tax and that’s the reason why govt’s hands are tied. Govt. needs the money to fund various programs and at the same time it is not generating enough revenue from direct taxes.
That’s the reason why, govt is bumping up its revenue through higher indirect taxes such as GST or excise duty as in the case of petrol and diesel.
Direct taxes are progressive as it taxes according to an individuals’ income however indirect tax such as excise duty or GST are regressive in the sense that the poorest of the poor and richest of the rich have to pay the same amount.
Does not matter, if you are an auto-driver or owner of a Mercedes, end of the day both pay the same price for petrol/diesel-that’s why it is regressive in nature.
But unlike direct tax where tax evasion is rampant, indirect tax can not be evaded due to their very nature and as long as huge no of Indians keep evading direct taxes, indirect tax such as excise duty will be difficult for the govt to reduce, because it may reduce the revenue and hamper may programs of the govt.