QUIZ – 2020: Insights Current Affairs Quiz, 21 August 2020

Solution: a)

The Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve is an International Biosphere Reserve in the Western Ghats and Nilgiri Hills ranges of South India. The Nilgiri Sub-Cluster is a part of the Western Ghats, which was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2012. It includes the Aralam, Mudumalai, Mukurthi, Nagarhole, Bandipur and Silent Valley national parks, as well as the Wayanad and Sathyamangalam wildlife sanctuaries.

Solution: c)

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is an internationally organized, non-profit corporation that has responsibility for Internet Protocol (IP) address space allocation, protocol identifier assignment, generic (gTLD) and country code (ccTLD) Top-Level Domain name system management, and root server system management functions. These services were originally performed under U.S. Government contract by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) and other entities. ICANN now performs the IANA function.

As a private-public partnership, ICANN is dedicated to preserving the operational stability of the Internet; to promoting competition; to achieving broad representation of global Internet communities; and to developing policy appropriate to its mission through bottom-up, consensus-based processes.

ICANN is responsible for coordinating the management of the technical elements of the DNS to ensure universal resolvability so that all users of the Internet can find all valid addresses. It does this by overseeing the distribution of unique technical identifiers used in the Internet’s operations, and delegation of Top-Level Domain names (such as .com, .info, etc.).

Other issues of concern to Internet users, such as the rules for financial transactions, Internet content control, unsolicited commercial email (spam), and data protection are outside the range of ICANN’s mission of technical coordination.

Among ICANN’s recent accomplishments:

• ICANN established market competition for generic domain name (gTLD) registrations resulting in a lowering of domain name costs by 80%.
• ICANN implemented a Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP), which has been used to resolve more than 5000 disputes over the rights to domain names. The UDRP is designed to be efficient and cost effective.
• ICANN adopted guidelines for the deployment of Internationalized Domain Names (IDN), opening the way for registration of domains in hundreds of the world’s languages.

Source

Solution: c)

India has contributed $1 million to the UN Special Purpose Trust Fund for the Resident Coordinator System. 

About SPTF:

The Special Purpose Trust Fund (SPTF) is a specific fund housed within the UN Secretariat.

It has been established to receive, consolidate, manage and account for all contributions and financial transactions of the Resident Coordinator (RC) system, in a transparent and effective way.

THE UN RESIDENT COORDINATOR:

• The UN Resident Coordinator (RC) system encompasses all organizations of the United Nations system dealing with operational activities for development, regardless of their formal presence in the country.
• The RC system aims to bring together the different UN agencies to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of operational activities at the country level.
• Role: Resident Coordinators lead UN country teams in 129 countries and are the designated representatives of the Secretary-General for development operations.

Solution: a)

After coming in second to Mauritius for two years, Singapore regained top spot as India’s largest source of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in the 2018-19 financial year.

Mauritius, which came in second with USD 8 billion of investments in 2018-19, was the top source of FDI for financial years 2016-17 and 2017-18 with USD 15.7 billion and USD 15.9 billion respectively.

The last time Singapore emerged as the top investment source was in 2015-16 with USD 13.7 billion.

For the fiscal year 2018-19, the next three positions are occupied by the Netherlands with USD 3.9 billion, United States with USD 3.1 billion and Japan with USD 3 billion.

The main reason Mauritius dominates investment inflows into India is because of its status as a tax haven.

Source 

Solution: d)

The Indian Ocean Commission (COI) is an intergovernmental organization that links African Indian Ocean nations: Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius, Réunion (an overseas region of France), and Seychelles. There are also five observers: China, India, Malta, the European Union and the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie.

The commission was created in 1982 in Port-Louis, Mauritius, and institutionalised in 1984. The secretariat is based in Mauritius. The current secretary-general is Hamada Madi.

Objectives:

• Political and diplomatic cooperation,
• Economic and commercial cooperation
• Sustainable development in a globalisation context, cooperation in the field of agriculture, maritime fishing, and the conservation of resources and ecosystems
• Strengthening of the regional cultural identity, cooperation in cultural, scientific, technical, educational and judicial fields.

ReCoMAP:

The Indian Ocean Commission has funded a number of regional and national conservation and alternative livelihoods projects through ReCoMAP, Regional Programme for the Sustainable Management of the Coastal Zones of the Countries of the Indian Ocean (PROGECO in French). This project ended in 2011.

Source