TNPSC Current Affairs June 1, 2017 for Group 1 and Group 2 Mains

TNPSC Current Affairs June 2017

1.India to formally become full member of SCO .

Russian President Vladimir Putin said that India will formally become a Full-fledged member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in upcoming SCO Meet to be held in Astana, Kazakhstan.

About Shanghai Cooperation Organisation:

• It is a permanent political, economic, and military bloc founded in 2001 in Shanghai, China by the leaders of Russia, Kazakhstan, China,  Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.
• It was earlier known as Shanghai Five which includes all the members of SCO except Uzbekistan founded in 1996.
• Uzbekistan was included in 2001 and was renamed to SCO and it has decided to admit India and Pakistan a full members on 2015.

India’s Benefit:

• India’s entry would help to get greater access to resource-rich Central Asian region.
• Central Asia and Russia are extremely rich in  fossil fuels, including oil, gas, coal , uranium and hydropower and more.The membership will allow India to have greater access to the region’s resources and facilitate further cooperation with countries of central Asia.
• It also provide an opportunity to address the threat of terrorism which has affected the peace and stability of region, since the SCO has mechanism to deal with the issue of terrorism, the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure, it will provide India a good platform to highlight terrorism and push Pakistan to abide.

2.Mega Food Park at Rayagada, Odisha. 

Harsimrat Kaur Badal, Honorable Minister of Food Processing Industries has inaugurated Mega Food Park at Rayagada, Odisha, with aim of adding value and reducing food wastage at each stage of the supply chain with particular focus on perishables.   

   

Importance of Scheme:

• The main objective of the scheme is to improving the entire food supply chain.
• It will create three schemes like Creation, Expansion of Food processing and Preservation Capacities, New Agro-Processing Clusters and Backward and Forward Linkages are on anvil.
• Scheme is also to bring down post-harvest losses preferably to zero level, provide quality food to consumers at cheaper price and for doubling of farmers' income  by boosting Food processing sector.
• To improve Food Processing sector the union Government has  sanctioned 42 mega food parks and 234 cold chain projects with 139 lakh tonnes of preserving and processing capacity of agro-produce worth Rs 35,000 crore. 
• This Food Parks will prevent ,  post harvest losses estimated as 90,000 crore annually.