All that was discussed in the House through the day
Some 184,447 cattle died due to Lumpy Skin Disease (LSD) across India during 2022-23, Parshottam Rupala, Union minister for fisheries, animal husbandry and dairying told the Lok Sabha February 7, 2023.
A homologous live attenuated LSD vaccine for use in cattle and buffaloes has been developed by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR). The vaccine technology has since been released by ICAR to Indian Immunological Ltd, Hyderabad and Biovet Pvt Ltd, Malur, Karnataka and the vaccine is in the testing stage before its commercial production, Rupala said.
In India, 104.2 million hectare (mha) of arable land is affected by different kinds of land degradation. Of this, 85.7 mha is affected by wind and water erosion, 17.5 mha by chemical degradation and 1.1 mha by physical degradation, Narendra Singh Tomar, Union minister for agriculture and farmers welfare told the Lok Sabha.
The Department of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare is implementing crop diversification programme in the original Green Revolution states — Haryana, Punjab and western Uttar Pradesh — to divert the area of water-intensive paddy to alternative crops like pulses, oilseeds, coarse cereals, nutri cereals, cotton, etc, Tomar told the Lok Sabha.
The government is promoting natural farming through a sub-scheme namely Bhartiya Prakritik Krishi Padhati (BPKP) under Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY) since 2020-21. So far, an area of 0.409 mha has been brought under BPKP in eight states, Tomar told the Lok Sabha.
The Union Cabinet approved the National Green Hydrogen Mission with an outlay of Rs 19,744 crore January 4, 2023. The mission targets a production capacity of five million metric tonnes per annum by 2030, RK Singh, Union minister of power and new and renewable energy told the Rajya Sabha.
Some 72,924.49 million units (MU) of solar energy have been generated in India in the current financial year as on December 31, 2022, according to the Central Electricity Authority.
Rajasthan (25,120.22 MU), Karnataka (9,983.65 MU) and Gujarat (7,210.67 MU) are the top three solar energy-producing states in India for the current financial year as on December 31, 2022, Singh told the Rajya Sabha.
The Centre had notified its intent to conduct Census 2021 in the Gazette of India March 28, 2019. Subsequently, a notification under the Citizenship Rules was published in the Gazette of India July 31,2019, to prepare and update the Population Register along with the first phase of Census — house listing and housing census. However, due to outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the exercise has been postponed until further orders, Nityanand Rai, minister of state in the Ministry of Home Affairs told the Lok Sabha.
There are 1,308,009 allopathic doctors registered with the state medical councils and the National Medical Commission (NMC) as of June, 2022. The doctor-population ratio in the country is 1:834 which is better than the WHO standard of 1:1000, Bharati Pravin Pawar, minister of state in The Ministry Of Health And Family Welfare told the Rajya Sabha.
The latest data of Large Sample Survey on Household Consumer Expenditure has been collected by NSSO in its 68th round, conducted in 2011-12. The Gini coefficient (measuring the inequality between different expenditure classes of the population) in rural areas is observed to be almost same in 2004-05 and 2011-12 at 0.27 and 0.28 respectively.
In the urban areas, the Gini coefficient has increased marginally to 0.37 in 2011-12, from 0.35 in 2004-05. The process to conduct the next Household Consumption Expenditure Survey has been initiated in August 2022, Pankaj Chaudhary, minister of state for finance told the Rajya Sabha.
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