Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 11 June 2021

::NATIONAL::

Haryana government has set a target to bring two-lakh acres of land under the crop diversification scheme, “Mera Pani Meri Virasat.”
Farmers can switch to crops that require less water like maize, pulses (urad dal, arhar dal, Moong, moth, Soybean, Guar), til, cotton, groundnut, castor, kharif onion and all Kharif fodder. However, the government dropped Bajra crop from the scheme this season.
Under the scheme, an incentive of Rs 7,000 per acre will be given to farmers for making the switch from paddy.
The government has issued directions to the deputy director of agriculture to make all efforts to achieve the target. Zone-wise officers have also been deputed.

The Kerala government’s revised budget for the current fiscal has announced the introduction of a Smart Kitchen project, which is meant to modernise kitchens and ease the difficulty faced by homemakers in household chores.

An amount of Rs 5 crore for the initial phase of the scheme, which would be implemented through the Kerala State Financial Enterprises (KSFE), a state-run chit fund and lending firm.
Under the scheme, Kerala State Financial Enterprises (KSFE)would give soft loans to women from all walks of life for purchasing household gadgets or equipment.
The cost of household equipment can be repaid as instalments within a particular period.
The interest of the loan/cost would be equally shared among the beneficiary, local self-government body and the state government. To implement the scheme, KSFE would start smart kitchen chits.

El Salvador has become the first country in the world to grant legal tender status to bitcoin.

Bitcoin is a digital or virtual currency created in 2009, allegedly by a Japanese entrepreneur named SatoshiNakamoto.
It uses peer-to-peer technology, with no central authority, to facilitate instant payments.
Bitcoins are created through a complex process known as "mining", and then monitored by a network of computers across the world.
Bitcoin is the first implementation of cryptocurrency concept.

Democrat Representative Zoe Lofgren and Republican John Curtis, introduced the Equal Access to Green cards for Legal Employment (EAGLE) Act of 2021, in the House of Representatives.

The bipartisan act seeks to phase out the seven per cent per-country limit on employment-based immigrant visas and raises the per-country limit on family-sponsored visas from seven per cent to 15 per cent.
It provides for a nine-year period for the elimination of this limit.
The seven per cent limit was introduced in the mid-20th century, which has led countries with relatively small populations to be allocated the same number of visas as a relatively large-population country, states a press release by the Representatives.

The Union Cabinet approved 5 MHz spectrum for railways to upgrade communication and signalling system.

5 MHz Spectrum in 700 MHz frequency band is allotted for public safety and security services at stations and trains.
With this spectrum, IR aims to provide LTE (Long Term Evolution) based Mobile Train Radio Communication to provide secure and reliable voice, video, and data communication services for operational, safety and security applications.
Also, IR has approved TCAS (Train Collision Avoidance System), an indigenously developed ATP (AutomaticTrain Protection) System.

The Cosmic Infrared Background Experiment-2 (CIBER-2) was launched by NASA on June 6, 2021 from the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, USA.

The objective of this mission is to count the number of stars that exist in the Universe.
The experiment is measuring a mysterious glow of infrared light that fills our skies called the cosmic infrared background, which is emitted by some of the most common stars.
The CIBER-2 instrument has been improved upon to see if any stars had been undercounted in the previous counting attempts.
The European Space Agency (ESA) infrared space observatory Herschel also counted the number of galaxies in infrared and measured their luminosity previously.