Current Affairs for SSC CGL Exams - 26 May 2015

::Economy:

Union Government approves 21 FDI proposal worth Rs 281 crore

Based on the recommendations of the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) in its 217th meeting held on 30th April 2015, the Central Government has approved twenty one (21) proposals of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) amounting to Rs.280.70 crore approximately.
Details of Proposals considered in the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) Meeting held on 09.04.2015 are as under:
• La Renon Healthcare’s proposal to invest Rs 100 crore in a brownfield project.
• Blue Dart Express’s proposal to acquire shares in Blue Dart Aviation Ltd and hike shareholding from 49 per cent to 74 per cent. It will infuse investment between 52.8 crore to Rs 69 crore rupees.
• Quickjet Cargo Airlines proposal to increase foreign shareholding in the company to 74 per cent from 62.34 per cent. The deal will entail FDI worth 14.40 crore rupees.
• Forever Living Imports (India) Pvt Ltd’s 18.30-crore rupees proposal to undertake single brand retailing of ‘Forever’ brand products in India.
However, FIPB has deferred 12 proposals including that of Mumbai-based Kotak Bank for increasing the aggregate foreign investment limit to 55 per cent in the bank.

::Newsmaker:

Union Government appoints Manoj Mishra as CMD of NFL

Government has appointed Manoj Mishra as Chairman and Managing Director of state-run National Fertilizers Ltd (NFL).
Mishra, currently posted as Director Finance at State Trading Corporation (STC), is likely to assume the charge of CMD of the fertiliser firm this week.
In September last year, government headhunters Public Enterprises Selection Board (PESB) had recommended Mishra's name for the top post at NFL. NFL's CMD post fell vacant after the retirement of Neeru Abrol in February 2014.
NFL has five gas-based urea plants viz Nangal & Bathinda in Punjab, Panipat in Haryana and two plants at Vijaipur in District Guna, Madhya Pradesh. The company has a total annual installed capacity of 35.68 lakh tonnes and is the second largest producer of urea in the country.

::International:

Bangladesh ratifies land boundary agreement protocol

The Bangladeshi Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, ratified the protocol on the Land Boundary Agreement (LBA) with India on 26th May. The ratification was the last of the approvals needed for the implementation of the protocol signed during the visit of the then Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, to Dhaka four years ago for exchange of enclaves. The Indian Parliament ratified it recently.
Exchange of instruments will now take place during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Bangladesh, Cabinet Secretary Musharraf Hossain Bhuyan said.
Under the protocol, 111 Indian enclaves inside Bangladesh and 51 Bangladeshi ones inside India were to be exchanged. Bangladesh will also get 2,777 acres of land, while India will get 2,267 acres.

::Environment:

Antarctic ice loss altering earth gravity

The Antarctic has suffered a sudden massive increase in ice loss equivalent of the volume of nearly 350,000 Empire State Buildings combined – in a previously stable region, scientists have revealed. The ice loss, reported in the journal Science, is so large that it causes small changes in the gravity field of the Earth.
Using measurements of the elevation of the Antarctic ice sheet made by satellites, researchers found that the Southern Antarctic Peninsula showed no signs of change up until 2009. However, around 2009, multiple glaciers along a vast coastal expanse around 460 miles long suddenly started to shed ice into the ocean at a nearly constant rate of 60 cubic km, or about 55 trillion litres of water, each year.
The ice loss makes the region the second largest contributor to sea level rise in Antarctica and researchers say it shows no sign of waning. Study leader Dr Bert Wouters, of Bristol University, said: “To date, the glaciers have added roughly 300 cubic km of water to the ocean. That’s the equivalent of the volume of nearly 350,000 Empire State Buildings  combined.”
The changes were observed using a satellite called CryoSat-2, a mission of the European Space Agency dedicated to the remote-sensing of ice. From an altitude of around 700km, the satellite sends a radar pulse to Earth, which is reflected by the ice and subsequently received back at the satellite.
From the time the pulse takes to travel, the elevation of the ice surface can be gauged accurately. By analysing roughly five years of the data, the researchers found the ice surface of some of the glaciers is currently being cut by as much as four metres each year.