QUIZ – 2020: Insights Current Affairs Quiz, 17 November 2020

Solution: a)

Purchasing Managers’ Index is an economic indicator that is calculated from monthly surveys of purchasing managers and supply executives from specific companies. PMI Manufacturing gives an indication of the economic health of the manufacturing sector. The most followed PMI readings come from Markit and Institute of Supply Management.

It is calculated separately for the manufacturing and services sectors and then a composite index too is constructed.

A figure above 50 denotes an expansion while anything below 50 denotes a contraction in activity. The higher the difference from this mid-point of 50, greater the expansion or contraction.

Also, the rate of expansion can be judged by comparing the PMI with that of the previous month reading.

Even central banks use the PMI to take decisions on interest rates. Besides influencing equity market movements, PMI releases also impact bond and currency markets.

Source

Solution: c)

Jim Corbett National Park is the oldest national park in India and was established in 1936 as Hailey National Park to protect the endangered Bengal tiger. It is located in Uttarakhand. The park was the first to come under the Project Tiger initiative.

Solution: d)

Regional Rural Banks (RRBs) were formed under the RRB Act, 1976 with an objective to provide credit and other facilities to small farmers, agricultural labourers, and artisans in rural areas.

As per RBI guidelines, the RRBs have to provide 75 per cent of their total credit under priority sector lending. RRBs are primarily catering to the credit and banking requirements of agriculture sector and rural areas with a focus on small and marginal farmers, micro and small enterprises, rural artisans and weaker sections of the society.

In addition, RRBs also provide lending to micro/small enterprises and small entrepreneurs in rural areas.

Scheduled commercial banks contributed the major share in agricultural and allied credit.  

Source

Solution: d)

Gee’s golden langur (Trachypithecus geei), also known as simply the golden langur, is an Old-World monkey found in a small region of western Assam, and in the neighbouring foothills of the Black Mountains of Bhutan. It is one of the most endangered primate species of India.

Golden langur is endemic to the semi-evergreen and mixed-deciduous forests straddling India and Bhutan.

The golden langurs in Assam are hemmed in by three rivers — Brahmaputra in the south, Manas in east and Sonkosh in west. Their northern limit is the range of hills in Bhutan up to 2,400 metres above sea level.

Obstructions such as electric wires, and gaps in the forest due to felling, have increased the threat of inbreeding among golden langurs.

Solution: a)

Starlink is a satellite internet constellation being constructed by SpaceX providing satellite Internet access.

The aim is to provide low-cost and reliable space-based Internet services to the world.

Why use low earth orbit instead of geostationary?

Geostationary orbit is located at a height of 35,786 km over the Earth’s surface, directly above the Equator. Satellites in this orbit move at speeds of about 11,000 km per hour, and complete one revolution of the Earth in the same time that the earth rotates once on its axis. To the observer on the ground, therefore, a satellite in geostationary orbit appears stationary.

Advantages: Signals from geostationary orbit can cover a very large part of the Earth. Signals from one satellite can cover roughly a third of the planet — and three to four satellites would be enough to cover the entire Earth. Also, because they appear to be stationary, it is easier to link to them.

Then what’s the issue?

There is a time lag — called latency — between a user seeking data, and the server sending that data.

And because data transfers cannot happen faster than the speed of light (in reality, they take place at significantly lower speeds), the longer the distance that needs to be covered the greater is the time lag, or latency.

A transmission from a satellite in geostationary orbit has a latency of about 600 milliseconds.

A satellite in the lower orbit, 200-2,000 km from the Earth’s surface, can bring the lag down to 20-30 milliseconds, roughly the time it takes for terrestrial systems to transfer data. But lower orbits have their own problem.

Owing to their lower height, their signals cover a relatively small area. As a result, many more satellites are needed in order to reach signals to every part of the planet.