Category:

Policy

Gujarat, Kerala & TN top FSSAI food safety index for 2020-21

The index ranks states on five parameters of food safety: human resources and institutional data, compliance, food testing facility, training and capacity building besides consumer empowerment.
Among small states, Goa came first followed by Meghalaya and Manipur. Among union territories, Jammu and Kashmir, Andaman and Nicobar Island and Delhi secured the top three positions on the index.

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Biden sanctions cryptocurrency exchange over ransomware attacks

The Treasury Department accuses Suex OTC, S.R.O. of facilitating transactions involving illicit proceeds for at least eight ransomware variants, marking its first such move against a virtual currency exchange over ransomware activity.
Hackers use ransomware to take down systems that control everything from hospital billing to manufacturing. They stop only after receiving hefty payments, typically paid in cryptocurrency.

Attacks are increasing in scale, sophistication and scope, the Treasury said. In 2020 ransomware payments reached over $400 million, more than four times the level in 2019, Anne Neuberger, deputy national security adviser for cyber, told reporters on the call.

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Most FDI proposals in 3 depts from nations sharing land border with India

As per that decision, FDI proposals from these countries need government approval for investments in India in any sector.

The major sectors under which these FDI proposals mainly came included manufacturing of heavy machinery, automobile, auto components; computer software and hardware; trading, ecommerce, and manufacturing of light engineering and electrical, the official said.

Besides, these three departments, the ministry of new and renewable energy and department of pharmaceuticals have also received several proposals from these countries, the official added.

Most of the foreign investment proposals have come from China and Hong Kong. Besides, Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh too have submitted certain applications.

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C-DOT developing tech to tap all media for broadcasting disaster alerts

The Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT) is developing the system for National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) and expects it to be ready in 18 months, CDOT chairman and executive director Rajkumar Upadhyay told PTI.

”We are developing a pan-India integrated alert system which can send out alerts across all mediums at one go in an emergency situation. It will be deployed by NDMA. Once the system is deployed, the department concerned will have to just mark the area on the map by pen and the alert will go across all mediums in that area in the local language,” Upadhyay said.

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Patient needs and insights drive new era of global kidney research, discovery, and personalised treatments

Kidney patients worldwide are demanding an end to outdated dialysis care, characterized by staggeringly high mortality rates, and greater access to new products and solutions aimed at detecting, preventing, and treating kidney diseases earlier and in ways that improve quality of life and decrease dependency and disease-related unemployment. They are also organizing and coordinating their policy and grassroots efforts in a sophisticated effort to advance more common sense regulatory and payment reforms that prioritize patient needs and fully support the timely entry of new, safe products into global consumer markets.

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 EXPLAINER: Why World Bank is under fire over set of rankings

The report is important to many companies and investors around the world: They use the World Bank’s “Doing Business” report to help decide where to invest money, open manufacturing plants or sell products.

Eager to attract investment, countries around the world, especially developing economies, have sought to improve their rankings in the World Bank’s report.Sometimes, nations would pursue substantive policy changes — by, for example, making it easier for businesses to pay taxes, obtain loans or enforce contracts.

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