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Here is a masonry blog layout with no sidebarSigns of farm ‘revolution’ in India as coronavirus prompts change
India is the world’s biggest exporter of rice and the world’s second-biggest producer after China. Across the country’s grain bowl states of Haryana and neighbouring Punjab, thousands of farmers like Kajal have been forced by the coronavirus to mechanise planting.
They are still wary of the technology and overturning the time-honoured use of manual labour.
HDFC Life’s net profit rises 6% to Rs 451 crore in June quarter
“ Our digital footprint allows us to service our customers remotely. More than 75 per cent of our branches are operational across the country. As the economy is coming to terms with the effects of the pandemic, we are increasingly witnessing encouraging on‐ground trends. Business has started to pick up on a month‐on‐month basis and we are seeing higher traction, especially in the individual protection business. As the situation begins to normalise, we expect life insurance to emerge as an important avenue for both protection as well as long term savings, and consequently help attract a higher quantum of inflows from Indian households.Given our wide bouquet of product offerings across segments and continued focus on a balanced product mix, we believe that we are well positioned to serve the anticipated demand uptick,” elaborated Padilkar.
ICICI Pru’s net profit remains almost flat at Rs 288 crore in June quarter
N S Kannan,MD & CEO, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance said, “The Covid-19 pandemic has had an impact on the way consumers perceive life insurance and protection products have therefore seen an increased demand. Even with the movement restrictions in the last quarter,the share of protection in our portfolio increased to 26 per cent of annualised premium equivalent (APE). This resulted in an expansion in the VNB margin from 21 per cent for Q1-FY2020 to 24.4 per cent for Q1-FY2021. Customers trust us to help them achieve their longterm financial goals and despite volatile markets our assets under management grew by 3.6 per cent to Rs 1.7 trillion for the quarter ended June 2020.”
France weighs insurance options to protect companies,jobs from future Pandemics
The goal is to protect companies and jobs from the damage that major events such as pandemics can cause, Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said in a statement. A working group consisting of lawmakers and industry representatives came up with a range of solutions on developing insurance coverage for such catastrophes, and Le Maire sought public comment on its proposals to inform the government’s work on the issue
Dam collapse in China could point to a ‘black swan’ disaster
But climate change is bringing a new normal of extremes and flood-risk policies decided a decade or two ago are no longer sufficient, said Benjamin Horton, director at the Earth Observatory of Singapore.
“What really needs to happen is to work with the ecosystems,not against them by building dams,by extending flood wetlands and flood plains and allowing the water to naturally mix with the environment,”he said.
HCQ,chloroquine have no antiviral effect against any coronavirus:Studies
Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) and chloroquine,two drugs,commonly used for the treatment of malaria, have been investigated for their potential to treat Covid-19 in more than 80 registered clinical trials, and have been shown to inhibit the novel coronavirus,SARS-COV-2 infection in cell cultures, the scientists said.
Facebook’s WhatsApp to partner with more Indian banks in financial inclusion push
WhatsApp will also expand pilot projects with banking and other partners to cover financial services such as pensions and insurance.
“Our collective aim over the next two to three years should be to help low-wage workers and the unorganised, informal economy easily accesses three products – insurance, micro-credit and pensions,” Abhijit Bose, WhatsApp’s India head told a fin-tech summit
EU makes world’s biggest ‘green recovery’ pledge – but will it hit the mark?
The money represents a 30% share of a mammoth package, comprising a 1.074 trillion euro EU budget for 2021-27 and a 750 billion euro coronavirus recovery fund. Leaders also agreed that even those parts of the overall package not specifically earmarked for climate spending must “do no harm” to the EU’s goal to become climate neutral by 2050.
India’s water crisis is forcing farmers to finally rethink what they grow
Water shortages are already acute: nearly half the country’s population faces high-to-extreme water stress and about 200,000 die each year due to inadequate access to safe water. Stoked by climate change, the water crisis has forced Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government to try and turn around decades of established farming practices and convince the country’s most powerful voting bloc to change the crops they plant. Water-guzzlers like rice and wheat are out, corn and pulses are in.
Don’t expect first Covid-19 vaccinations until early 2021, says WHO expert
Govt to soon come out with a list of strategic sectors: DEA Secretary
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had in May announced that there will be a maximum of four public sector companies in strategic sectors, and state-owned firms in other segments will eventually be privatised.
“One important thing that I would like to mention is that the government should soon come out (with guidelines on) privatisation of the public sector companies,” Economic Affairs Secretary Tarun Bajaj said.
“This is a major announcement. I would say after 1956 when we decided to have public sector enterprises as our showpieces, this is the first time that any government has said that we will not have companies in the non-strategic sector in the public sector and in the strategic sectors also we will have less number of companies,” he said.
Verisk releases New Ransomware Model as part of Cyber Risk Platform
ICICI Lombard partners with Phone Pe to offer Hospital Daily Cash benefit
It is a customized hospitalization policy that allows PhonePe users to get an assured amount if they are hospitalized due to injury or illnesses including COVID-19. The biggest benefit of this product is that hospital bills are not required for the claim. A Discharge Certificate would be sufficient in most cases for the claim processing. The cover can be availed in less than 2 minutes as the process is quite simple and customers can view their policy documents instantly on the app.
Global coronavirus cases exceed 15 million
The top five countries with the most cases is rounded out by Brazil, India, Russia and South Africa. But, the Reuters tally shows the disease is accelerating the fastest in the Americas, which account for more than half the world’s infections and half its deaths.
Globally, the rate of new infections shows no sign of slowing, according to the Reuters tally, based on official reports.
After the first COVID-19 case was reported in Wuhan, China, in early January, it took about 15 weeks to reach 2 million cases. By contrast, it took just eight days to climb above 15 million from the 13 million reached on July 13.
India watchdog bans former Deloitte partner over IL&FS unit audit
PM Modi seeks US investments in Indian healthcare,agri,insurance & clean energy sectors
“India invites you to invest in finance and insurance. India has raised FDI cap for investment in insurance to 49%. Now 100% FDI is permitted for investment in insurance intermediaries,” he said.
He said that reforms in many sectors like agriculture, medicine, energy, space, aviation and others have made them attractive destination for investment. FDI limit in sectors like Defence was increased.
Opportunities in technology also include opportunities in the frontier technologies of 5G, Big data analytics, Quantum computing, Block-chain and Internet of things
China offers more financial support for flood-hit areas
Separately, the CBIRC urged insurers to properly perform investigations and claims settlement and arrange financial resources in advance to help flood-hit companies and people resume production and normal lives in a timely manner.Large parts of China were reeling on Friday from the worst floods in decades, which destroyed homes and affected millions of people.
SoftBank-backed fintech startup seeks $3.5 billion value in IPO
The startup plans to secure about $250 million in a round of financing at a $2 billion-plus valuation before a September 2021 initial public offering, co-founder Yashish Dahiya told Bloomberg News. Policybazaar is now selecting two to three IPO lead underwriters from a roster that includes several Wall Street banks, said Dahiya, chief executive officer of Policybazaar parent ETech Aces Marketing and Consulting Pvt.“The IPO size will be about $500 million,” Dahiya said from London, where he is currently based. “We have global interest and will raise in the coming weeks” for the pre-IPO financing.