Today's Hot Stories - December 27, 2012
10 Headlines for Today
(1) Jayalalithaa walks out of NDC meet
(2) Delhi gang-rape victim in ‘extremely critical condition’
(3) Mandela discharged from hospital
(4) 2% interest subsidy for exports extended for one more year
(5) DGCA to ask for more details from Kingfisher on its finances
(6) Classic Ferrari set to become world’s most expensive car
(7) Australia 440-8 at stumps
(8) South Africa clinches T20 series
(9) Bopanna to pair with Ram in men’s doubles at Chennai Open
(10) Parrots have personal tastes in music
5 Stories for Today
(1) At Modi’s swearing-in, some clues about his NDA
(2) Syrian military police chief defects
(3) Bangalore ranked third in job generation in 2012
(4) EU promotes potato to replace rice in Asia
(5) Manmohan hints at cutting subsidies
(1) At Modi’s swearing-in, some clues about his NDA
In a preview of the National Democratic Alliance’s future contours should Narendra Modi ever get to head it, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa, Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal of the Shiromani Akali Dal, Indian National Lok Dal chief Omprakash Chautala, the warring Thackeray cousins and Republican Party of India leader Ramdas Athavale attended the Gujarat Chief Minister’s swearing-in at the sprawling Sardar Patel Stadium here on Wednesday.
But the presence of mostly old and some new supporters was evened out by the absence of key players that the Bharatiya Janata Party will need to keep within the “NDA and fellow travellers” fold if it is to hope to come to power in 2014: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar of the JD(U), who is part of the NDA, and Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, whose BJD left the NDA before the 2009 elections. Both leaders, who see Mr. Modi as a polarising figure, kept away. The Asom Gana Parishad, another potential NDA invitee, also remained unrepresented.
Sources said Mr. Modi made concerted efforts to bring in Mr. Patnaik but failed. NDA convener and JD(U) leader Sharad Yadav, too, gave the function a miss. The JD(U) contested the Gujarat elections alone and won one seat.
Raj Thackeray of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena and Uddhav Thackeray of the Shiv Sena were among the prominent attendees, as was Mr. Chautala and Mr. Athavale, whose parties are now not part of the NDA.
Uttar Pradesh industrialist Subroto Roy, known to be close to the Samajwadi Party that rules the State, was seen warmly greeting BJP leaders. Apart from the BJP’s top national leaders — L.K. Advani, Nitin Gadkari, Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley — senior BJP leader from Bihar C.P. Thakur, who had objected to Mr. Modi calling Union Minister Shashi Tharoor’s wife Sunanda Pushkar a “50 crore girlfriend” was also present. However, Sushil Modi, the BJP’s top leader from Bihar and the State’s Deputy Chief Minister, kept away.
Seven cabinet rank ministers and nine ministers of state were sworn in along with the chief minister. Two senior ministers in the outgoing cabinet, Vajubhai Vala, who has been a finance minister nine times, and Narottam Patel, a veteran leader from south Gujarat, have been dropped.
(2) Syrian military police chief defects
Syria’s military police chief has defected, saying he felt that the army was no longer acting in the people’s best interest.
“I am Major General Abdul Aziz Jassem al-Shallal, chief of the military police in Syria, I declare my defection from the regime’s army,” he said Tuesday in a video aired by news channel Al Arabiya.
He cited the army’s “deviation from its fundamental mission to protect the nation, and transformation into gangs of killing and destruction,” according to the video that was also posted online.
Al-Shallal was speaking from near the Turkish border and said he had been waiting for the right circumstances to defect.
“Definitely, there are other high-ranking officers who want to defect,” but close monitoring by the government “is not suitable for them to declare defection,” he said.
(3) Bangalore ranked third in job generation in 2012
The year 2012 saw a 21 per cent decline in job generation in various sectors across India.
Bangalore ranked third among major cities as over 75,000 jobs were generated between January 1 and December 15, 2012, according to an analysis carried out by Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (Assocham).
The National Capital Region (NCR) topped the country as over 1.1 lakh jobs were generated during the period followed by Mumbai with over 77,000 jobs. Chennai secured the fourth place by generating over 44,000 jobs.
The least number of jobs were generated in Kolkata (over 25,000) among the top five metros, said D.S. Rawat, secretary-general, Assocham.
Over 5.3 lakh jobs were generated during the period across India. The first half of the year saw over 2.8 lakh jobs generated, said a survey, ‘Job trends across India in 2012’.
Assocham sourced its inputs primarily from data tracked on a daily basis for vacancies posted by about 4,000 companies in job portals such as timesjobs.com, naukari.com, monster.com and shine.com and job-related advertisements published in national and regional newspapers for 56 cities and 32 sectors. Information technology (IT) sector topped the list by generating over 2.1 lakh jobs in the country. Academics and education ranked second with over 34,500 jobs followed by insurance (over 27,100), banking (24,500), automobile (22,890), financial services (22,500), manufacturing (20,400), engineering (18,650), hospitality (16,100) and IT hardware (15,600 jobs).
Academics and education sectors registered a 16 per cent growth in job generation in the first six months of 2012.
The aviation sector registered a job generation growth of over 78 per cent in the second half of the year (till December 15) followed by sports (41 per cent) and retail (6 per cent).
In Delhi, the telecom sector generated maximum employment opportunities with over 53,000 jobs followed by IT (over 11,000 jobs), hospitality, manufacturing, architecture, infrastructure, textile, banking, real estate and gems and jewellery.
Assocham analysis shows that job market has slightly recovered in the last six months as employment generation growth declined by about 15 per cent between July and December 15 while the decline was by over 25 per cent during the first six months of the year.
(4) EU promotes potato to replace rice in Asia
The potato has a 12,000-year-old history but an even brighter future as a crop that is set to replace rice as a staple in the Asian rice-consuming countries. It requires less amount of water compared to other basic food products, without compromising the nutrition value. Potato, therefore, is increasingly being promoted, in the genetically modified organism-free European Union (EU), as the foremost solution for meeting the increased food demand for an estimated 6 billion world population by 2030.
Dutch researchers from the famous Wageningen University — dedicated to bio-based economy in food, feed and chemicals produced from renewable resources — told a visiting press delegation that if prepared in a healthy manner and consumed in the right proportion (balanced reduction of calories), consumers can benefit from the many nutrients and dietary fibres in the tuber.
The advantages of potato over other staples were discussed at the “Potato Potential Conference”, which was followed by a vibrant food exposition organised by the Enterprise Europe Network and Food Valley that facilitated networking of global companies in the potato business. The EU’s focus is now on Eastern Europe and China for processed food markets. The visiting journalists were told that China is already moving towards experiments with replacing rice with potato.
The diverse advantage of potato — the fourth largest consumed food in the world after maize, rice and wheat — is emphasised by studies that have shown potato containing less calories than pasta, rice and bread. The tuber consumes about 30 per cent less water to grow than rice and is being projected as a crop that can contribute to weight loss “if prepared and consumed healthily.”
Researchers and scientists are working towards facilitating higher and sustainable crop yields per hectare that are free from disease and pests.
With an annual export of about eight million tonnes of certified seed potato, the tuber is not only a staple food for the Dutch, but a major contributor to the economy. Netherlands, known for its success in water management, is the world’s third largest agriculture exporter, second biggest agri-food exporter and third largest potato exporter.
Quality standards
The Dutch potato sector is constantly breeding, growing and selecting new varieties based on market demands. Simultaneously, processing companies (like Aviko) continuously experiment with the quality and flavour of their potato fries and how to get the best by-products from wastes like potato peels and starch-rich waste water.
The potato crop is normally hit by the most common late blight disease (caused by phytophthora infestans), scab, rhizoctonia, canker, blackleg, fusarium and viral diseases. All research at Wageningen is in partnership with private and multinational companies and, at the same time, with medical institutions so as to not lose sight of the nutritional and safety aspects in food products.
The EU has laid down stringent standards for member countries for seeds and seed potatoes to coordinate with the demand and supply. The visiting press team saw the high standards maintained by the Netherlands government at the NAK, the Dutch General Inspection Service for Agriculture Seeds and Seed Potatoes at Emmeloord. Technical Coordinator of Inspections Jaap Haak explained that every seed potato that comes out of a farm must have quality certification from the NAK.
The Plant Protection Service of the Dutch Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality, too, monitors the quality of seed potatoes, especially on phytosanitary issues of health, varietal purity and physiological conditions. Interestingly, the NAK has on its board representatives of farmers, breeders, propagators and traders in a set-up in which the farm sector formulates its own standards in line with international measures. The costs are shared by farmers and traders.
Mr. Haak said that only produce from fields free of nematodes are accepted for inspection. Farmers must also specify the sources of the seed, its variety and class. Inspections are visual, in the labs as well as on-field. As the grower prepares the lots for delivery, NAK inspectors visit the plot at least once a day to ensure that only the approved lots are being delivered.
Nieck’s Witte
Under its Participatory Potato Breeding programme, the Wageningen University collaborates with farmers in producing required varieties. Niek Vos, an organic farmer-breeder, took 12 years to develop the Bionca variety, by crossing small South Holland potatoes with blight-resistant potatoes from Mexico. His is a white fleshy potato variety, resistant to late blight disease, and he sells it under his own brand name — Niek’s Witte (Nieck’s White).
“I turned to organic farming because when I was in conventional farming, my neighbours complained that the late blight afflicting their crop was coming from my field. I thought it was better to grow a variety that has no blight and now I have my own Niek’s Witte,” he said.
He also has an on-farm cold storage of 100 tonnes capacity. He uses cow manure on his well-managed and clean farm and follows the good practice of keeping his 70-hectare field free after every two years to maintain soil health.
The organic potato is three to four times more expensive than the conventional one, but Mr. Vos believes this market is growing.
Mr. Vos has an India connection. After finishing studies, his daughter Michiel travelled to Puducherry “to think out” what she wanted to do in life. She decided to return to Netherlands and join her father in growing potatoes — such is the power of the tuber in Netherlands.
(5) Manmohan hints at cutting subsidies
Describing the current economic situation as a difficult one, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday hinted at tough decisions like hike in energy prices and reduction of subsidies to achieve the growth target of 8 per cent in the 12th Five Year Plan.
Inaugurating the National Development Council (NDC) meeting, Dr. Singh cautioned that “business as usual” policies will not be sufficient to achieve the scaled down growth target of 8 per cent, which he said was “ambitious”.
The NDC, which comprises Cabinet Ministers and state Chief Ministers, is meeting here to approve the 12th Plan (2012—17) document.
The Planning Commission for the second time proposed reduction in the average annual growth target for the 12th Plan. It was first scaled down from 9 per cent to 8.2 per cent and now to 8 per cent.
Noting that energy prices in India are “too low”, Dr. Singh said, “some phased price adjustment is necessary“.
The central government and the states, he said, “must work together to create awareness in the public that we must limit the extent of energy subsidies”.
The Prime Minister further said that the 12th Plan has made a case for containing subsidy as failure to control them would mean that “other plan expenditures have to be cut or the fiscal deficit target exceeded”.
(1) Jayalalithaa walks out of NDC meet
(2) Delhi gang-rape victim in ‘extremely critical condition’
(3) Mandela discharged from hospital
(4) 2% interest subsidy for exports extended for one more year
(5) DGCA to ask for more details from Kingfisher on its finances
(6) Classic Ferrari set to become world’s most expensive car
(7) Australia 440-8 at stumps
(8) South Africa clinches T20 series
(9) Bopanna to pair with Ram in men’s doubles at Chennai Open
(10) Parrots have personal tastes in music
5 Stories for Today
(1) At Modi’s swearing-in, some clues about his NDA
(2) Syrian military police chief defects
(3) Bangalore ranked third in job generation in 2012
(4) EU promotes potato to replace rice in Asia
(5) Manmohan hints at cutting subsidies
(1) At Modi’s swearing-in, some clues about his NDA
In a preview of the National Democratic Alliance’s future contours should Narendra Modi ever get to head it, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa, Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal of the Shiromani Akali Dal, Indian National Lok Dal chief Omprakash Chautala, the warring Thackeray cousins and Republican Party of India leader Ramdas Athavale attended the Gujarat Chief Minister’s swearing-in at the sprawling Sardar Patel Stadium here on Wednesday.
But the presence of mostly old and some new supporters was evened out by the absence of key players that the Bharatiya Janata Party will need to keep within the “NDA and fellow travellers” fold if it is to hope to come to power in 2014: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar of the JD(U), who is part of the NDA, and Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, whose BJD left the NDA before the 2009 elections. Both leaders, who see Mr. Modi as a polarising figure, kept away. The Asom Gana Parishad, another potential NDA invitee, also remained unrepresented.
Sources said Mr. Modi made concerted efforts to bring in Mr. Patnaik but failed. NDA convener and JD(U) leader Sharad Yadav, too, gave the function a miss. The JD(U) contested the Gujarat elections alone and won one seat.
Raj Thackeray of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena and Uddhav Thackeray of the Shiv Sena were among the prominent attendees, as was Mr. Chautala and Mr. Athavale, whose parties are now not part of the NDA.
Uttar Pradesh industrialist Subroto Roy, known to be close to the Samajwadi Party that rules the State, was seen warmly greeting BJP leaders. Apart from the BJP’s top national leaders — L.K. Advani, Nitin Gadkari, Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley — senior BJP leader from Bihar C.P. Thakur, who had objected to Mr. Modi calling Union Minister Shashi Tharoor’s wife Sunanda Pushkar a “50 crore girlfriend” was also present. However, Sushil Modi, the BJP’s top leader from Bihar and the State’s Deputy Chief Minister, kept away.
Seven cabinet rank ministers and nine ministers of state were sworn in along with the chief minister. Two senior ministers in the outgoing cabinet, Vajubhai Vala, who has been a finance minister nine times, and Narottam Patel, a veteran leader from south Gujarat, have been dropped.
(2) Syrian military police chief defects
Syria’s military police chief has defected, saying he felt that the army was no longer acting in the people’s best interest.
“I am Major General Abdul Aziz Jassem al-Shallal, chief of the military police in Syria, I declare my defection from the regime’s army,” he said Tuesday in a video aired by news channel Al Arabiya.
He cited the army’s “deviation from its fundamental mission to protect the nation, and transformation into gangs of killing and destruction,” according to the video that was also posted online.
Al-Shallal was speaking from near the Turkish border and said he had been waiting for the right circumstances to defect.
“Definitely, there are other high-ranking officers who want to defect,” but close monitoring by the government “is not suitable for them to declare defection,” he said.
(3) Bangalore ranked third in job generation in 2012
The year 2012 saw a 21 per cent decline in job generation in various sectors across India.
Bangalore ranked third among major cities as over 75,000 jobs were generated between January 1 and December 15, 2012, according to an analysis carried out by Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (Assocham).
The National Capital Region (NCR) topped the country as over 1.1 lakh jobs were generated during the period followed by Mumbai with over 77,000 jobs. Chennai secured the fourth place by generating over 44,000 jobs.
The least number of jobs were generated in Kolkata (over 25,000) among the top five metros, said D.S. Rawat, secretary-general, Assocham.
Over 5.3 lakh jobs were generated during the period across India. The first half of the year saw over 2.8 lakh jobs generated, said a survey, ‘Job trends across India in 2012’.
Assocham sourced its inputs primarily from data tracked on a daily basis for vacancies posted by about 4,000 companies in job portals such as timesjobs.com, naukari.com, monster.com and shine.com and job-related advertisements published in national and regional newspapers for 56 cities and 32 sectors. Information technology (IT) sector topped the list by generating over 2.1 lakh jobs in the country. Academics and education ranked second with over 34,500 jobs followed by insurance (over 27,100), banking (24,500), automobile (22,890), financial services (22,500), manufacturing (20,400), engineering (18,650), hospitality (16,100) and IT hardware (15,600 jobs).
Academics and education sectors registered a 16 per cent growth in job generation in the first six months of 2012.
The aviation sector registered a job generation growth of over 78 per cent in the second half of the year (till December 15) followed by sports (41 per cent) and retail (6 per cent).
In Delhi, the telecom sector generated maximum employment opportunities with over 53,000 jobs followed by IT (over 11,000 jobs), hospitality, manufacturing, architecture, infrastructure, textile, banking, real estate and gems and jewellery.
Assocham analysis shows that job market has slightly recovered in the last six months as employment generation growth declined by about 15 per cent between July and December 15 while the decline was by over 25 per cent during the first six months of the year.
(4) EU promotes potato to replace rice in Asia
The potato has a 12,000-year-old history but an even brighter future as a crop that is set to replace rice as a staple in the Asian rice-consuming countries. It requires less amount of water compared to other basic food products, without compromising the nutrition value. Potato, therefore, is increasingly being promoted, in the genetically modified organism-free European Union (EU), as the foremost solution for meeting the increased food demand for an estimated 6 billion world population by 2030.
Dutch researchers from the famous Wageningen University — dedicated to bio-based economy in food, feed and chemicals produced from renewable resources — told a visiting press delegation that if prepared in a healthy manner and consumed in the right proportion (balanced reduction of calories), consumers can benefit from the many nutrients and dietary fibres in the tuber.
The advantages of potato over other staples were discussed at the “Potato Potential Conference”, which was followed by a vibrant food exposition organised by the Enterprise Europe Network and Food Valley that facilitated networking of global companies in the potato business. The EU’s focus is now on Eastern Europe and China for processed food markets. The visiting journalists were told that China is already moving towards experiments with replacing rice with potato.
The diverse advantage of potato — the fourth largest consumed food in the world after maize, rice and wheat — is emphasised by studies that have shown potato containing less calories than pasta, rice and bread. The tuber consumes about 30 per cent less water to grow than rice and is being projected as a crop that can contribute to weight loss “if prepared and consumed healthily.”
Researchers and scientists are working towards facilitating higher and sustainable crop yields per hectare that are free from disease and pests.
With an annual export of about eight million tonnes of certified seed potato, the tuber is not only a staple food for the Dutch, but a major contributor to the economy. Netherlands, known for its success in water management, is the world’s third largest agriculture exporter, second biggest agri-food exporter and third largest potato exporter.
Quality standards
The Dutch potato sector is constantly breeding, growing and selecting new varieties based on market demands. Simultaneously, processing companies (like Aviko) continuously experiment with the quality and flavour of their potato fries and how to get the best by-products from wastes like potato peels and starch-rich waste water.
The potato crop is normally hit by the most common late blight disease (caused by phytophthora infestans), scab, rhizoctonia, canker, blackleg, fusarium and viral diseases. All research at Wageningen is in partnership with private and multinational companies and, at the same time, with medical institutions so as to not lose sight of the nutritional and safety aspects in food products.
The EU has laid down stringent standards for member countries for seeds and seed potatoes to coordinate with the demand and supply. The visiting press team saw the high standards maintained by the Netherlands government at the NAK, the Dutch General Inspection Service for Agriculture Seeds and Seed Potatoes at Emmeloord. Technical Coordinator of Inspections Jaap Haak explained that every seed potato that comes out of a farm must have quality certification from the NAK.
The Plant Protection Service of the Dutch Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality, too, monitors the quality of seed potatoes, especially on phytosanitary issues of health, varietal purity and physiological conditions. Interestingly, the NAK has on its board representatives of farmers, breeders, propagators and traders in a set-up in which the farm sector formulates its own standards in line with international measures. The costs are shared by farmers and traders.
Mr. Haak said that only produce from fields free of nematodes are accepted for inspection. Farmers must also specify the sources of the seed, its variety and class. Inspections are visual, in the labs as well as on-field. As the grower prepares the lots for delivery, NAK inspectors visit the plot at least once a day to ensure that only the approved lots are being delivered.
Nieck’s Witte
Under its Participatory Potato Breeding programme, the Wageningen University collaborates with farmers in producing required varieties. Niek Vos, an organic farmer-breeder, took 12 years to develop the Bionca variety, by crossing small South Holland potatoes with blight-resistant potatoes from Mexico. His is a white fleshy potato variety, resistant to late blight disease, and he sells it under his own brand name — Niek’s Witte (Nieck’s White).
“I turned to organic farming because when I was in conventional farming, my neighbours complained that the late blight afflicting their crop was coming from my field. I thought it was better to grow a variety that has no blight and now I have my own Niek’s Witte,” he said.
He also has an on-farm cold storage of 100 tonnes capacity. He uses cow manure on his well-managed and clean farm and follows the good practice of keeping his 70-hectare field free after every two years to maintain soil health.
The organic potato is three to four times more expensive than the conventional one, but Mr. Vos believes this market is growing.
Mr. Vos has an India connection. After finishing studies, his daughter Michiel travelled to Puducherry “to think out” what she wanted to do in life. She decided to return to Netherlands and join her father in growing potatoes — such is the power of the tuber in Netherlands.
(5) Manmohan hints at cutting subsidies
Describing the current economic situation as a difficult one, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday hinted at tough decisions like hike in energy prices and reduction of subsidies to achieve the growth target of 8 per cent in the 12th Five Year Plan.
Inaugurating the National Development Council (NDC) meeting, Dr. Singh cautioned that “business as usual” policies will not be sufficient to achieve the scaled down growth target of 8 per cent, which he said was “ambitious”.
The NDC, which comprises Cabinet Ministers and state Chief Ministers, is meeting here to approve the 12th Plan (2012—17) document.
The Planning Commission for the second time proposed reduction in the average annual growth target for the 12th Plan. It was first scaled down from 9 per cent to 8.2 per cent and now to 8 per cent.
Noting that energy prices in India are “too low”, Dr. Singh said, “some phased price adjustment is necessary“.
The central government and the states, he said, “must work together to create awareness in the public that we must limit the extent of energy subsidies”.
The Prime Minister further said that the 12th Plan has made a case for containing subsidy as failure to control them would mean that “other plan expenditures have to be cut or the fiscal deficit target exceeded”.
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