Shoonya Campaign (GS Paper 3, Environment)
Why in news?
- Recently, NITI Aayog held a day-long forum to commemorate the one-year anniversary of Shoonya, India’s zero pollution e-mobility campaign.
- Shoonya is a consumer awareness campaign to reduce air pollution by promoting the use of electric vehicles (EVs) for ride-hailing and deliveries. The campaign has 130 industry partners, including ride-hailing, delivery and EV companies.
Key Highlights:
- The National Programme on Advanced Chemistry Cell (ACC) Energy Storage (Part III) report was launched during the event.
- The report highlights that India’s $2.5-billion Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme for Advanced Chemistry Cell (ACC) energy storage is critical for meeting the projected cumulative battery demand of 106–260 GWh by 2030 to successfully realize the country’s vision for EV adoption and grid decarbonisation.
Scope for EVs in India:
- Rapid global urbanization and e-commerce sales are driving significant growth in urban freight and mobility demand. In India, these sectors are expected to grow at a CAGR of 8% through 2030.
- If this demand is met by internal combustion vehicles (ICE), it would significantly increase local air pollution, carbon emissions, and lead to adverse public health effects. EVs offer an opportunity to address these challenges.
- Compared to ICE vehicles, EVs do not emit PM or NOx emissions at the tailpipe; they release 60% less CO2 and have 75% lower operating costs.
Background:
- NITI Aayog, with RMI and RMI India’s support, launched Shoonya—an initiative to promote zero-pollution delivery vehicles by working with consumers and industry on 15th September 2021.
- The campaign aims to accelerate adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) in the urban deliveries segment and create consumer awareness about the benefits of zero-pollution delivery.
Initiatives by Shoonya:
- Shoonyasupplements existing national and sub-national EV policies as well as corporate efforts in India by creating consumer awareness and demand for zero pollution rides and deliveries in Indian cities.
- Till April 2022, the estimated number of electric deliveries and rides completed by corporate partners via the Shoonya campaign was close to 20 million and 15 million, respectively. This translates to a carbon dioxide emission savings of over 13,000 tonnes.
- If all final-mile deliveries and rides in India were shoonya, India would be well on its way to improving air quality, reducing public health costs, enhancing energy security, and achieving its climate targets.
Way Forward:
- The electrification of the ride-hailing and delivery sector in India could mitigate close to 54 MT of CO2 emissions, 16,800 tonnes of PM emissions, and 537,000 tonnes of NOx pollution, saving roughly 5.7 lakh crore in expenditures over a year.
- Thus, Shoonya can lead to dramatic emission reductions in the transport sector, supporting India’s five-point agenda (Panchamrit), announced at COP 26, to reduce carbon emissions and secure its 2070 climate goals.
National List of Essential Medicines, 2022
(GS Paper 3, Science and Tech)
Why in news?
- Recently, the National List of Essential Medicines (NLEM), 2022, was released, with 384 drugs in it across 27 categories.
- While 34 new drugs are on the list, 26 drugs from NLEM, 2015, including common gastrointestinal medicines Ranitidine and Sucralfate, have been dropped.
- Prices of essential medicines are regulated by the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority.
Essential medicines on the list:
- Four major anti-cancer drugs, hydrochloride, HCI trihydrate, lenalidomide and leuprolide acetate as well as psychotherapeutic drugs, nicotine replacement therapy and anti-parasitic drugs like ivermectin, mupirocin (topical antibiotic), and meropenem (antibiotic) are on the list.
- It also includes four drugs that are still under patent; bedaquiline and delamanid, used in the treatment of multiple drug-resistant tuberculosis, dolutegravir used to treat human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection, and daclatasavir used in treating viral infections such as Hepatitis C.
- Endocrine medicines and contraceptives like fludrocortisone, ormeloxifene, insulin glargine and teneligliptin (for diabetes control) have also been added to the list.
- Montelukast, acting on the respiratory tract, the ophthalmological drug latanoprost and cardiovascular medicines dabigatran and tenecteplase are on the list too.
Essential medicines omitted from the list:
- Omissions include commonly used gastrointestinal drugs ranitidine, sucralfate, white petrolatum (for treating skin conditions), atenolol and methyldopa (for high blood pressure).
How are drugs eliminated and added to the list?
- For inclusion in NLEM, the drugs have to be useful in treating diseases which are a public health problem in India.
- They have to be licensed/approved by the Drugs Controller General (DCGI), have proven efficacy, a safety profile based on scientific evidence, comparatively cost effective, and aligned with the current treatment guidelines.
- They have to be recommended under the National Health Programs of India (for instance, ivermectin is part of the Accelerated Plan for Elimination of Lymphatic Filariasis, 2018).
- When more than one medicine is available from the same therapeutic class, a prototype that is the best suited medicine of that class is included.
- Besides this, the price of the total treatment is considered and not the unit price of a medicine. Fixed dose combinations are usually not included.
Elimination criteria:
- A medicine is deleted from the list if it is banned in India; if there are reports of concerns on the safety profile and if a medicine with better efficacy and is cheaper is available.
- If the disease, for which a particular medicine is recommended, is no longer a national health concern, the drug is taken off the list.
- Additionally, in case of antimicrobials, if the resistance pattern has rendered an antimicrobial ineffective, it is removed from the NLEM.
What is the purpose of having a list?
- The primary purpose of the NLEM is to promote rational use of medicines considering three important aspects which are cost, safety and efficacy.
- It also helps in optimum utilisation of healthcare resources and budget, drug procurement policies, health insurance, improving prescribing habits, medical education and training and drafting pharmaceutical policies.
- In NLEM, the medicines are categorised based on the level of the healthcare system as primary, secondary and tertiary.
- The NLEM is a dynamic document and is revised on a regular basis considering the changing public health priorities as well as advancement in pharmaceutical knowledge.
Background:
- The National List of Essential Medicines was first formulated in 1996 and was revised thrice in 2003, 2011 and 2015, before 2022.
- The NLEM independent Standing National Committee on Medicines (SNCM) was constituted by the Union Health Ministry in 2018.
- After detailed consultation with experts and stakeholders, the committee revised the NLEM, 2015 and submitted its report on NLEM, 2022 to the Health Ministry. The government accepted the recommendations of the committee and adopted the list.
Ageing population India
(GS Paper 2, Social Justice)
Context:
- The share of the elderly (persons aged 60 years and above) in India’s population, close to 9% in 2011, is growing fast and may reach 18% by 2036 according to the National Commission on Population.
- If India is to ensure a decent quality of life for the elderly in the near future, planning and providing for it must begin today.
Challenge:
- Life expectancy in India has more than doubled since Independence; from around 32 years in the late 1940s to 70 years or so today.
- Over the same period, the fertility rate has crashed from about six children per woman to just two, liberating women from the shackles of repeated child-bearing and child care.
- All this is good news, but it also creates a new challenge, the ageing of the population.
Mental health issues in elderly:
- Recent work on mental health among the elderly in India sheds new light on their dire predicament.
Case of Tamil Nadu:
- Among persons aged 60 and above, 30% to 50% (depending on gender and age group) had symptoms that make them likely to be depressed. The proportion with depression symptoms is much higher for women than men, and rises sharply with age. In most cases, depression remains undiagnosed and untreated.
- As one might expect, depression is strongly correlated with poverty and poor health, but also with loneliness.
- Among the elderly living alone, in the Tamil Nadu sample, 74% had symptoms that would classify them as likely to be mildly depressed or worse on the short-form Geriatric Depression Scale. A large majority of elderly persons living alone are women, mainly widows.
Role of old-age pensions:
- The hardships of old age are not related to poverty alone, but some cash often helps. Cash can certainly help to cope with many health issues, and sometimes to avoid loneliness as well. The first step towards a dignified life for the elderly is to protect them from destitution and all the deprivations that may come with it. That is why old-age pensions are a vital part of social security systems around the world.
- India has important schemes of non-contributory pensions for the elderly, widowed women and disabled persons under the National Social Assistance Programme (NSAP), administered by the Ministry of Rural Development.
Bottlenecks in NSAP:
- Alas, eligibility for NSAP is restricted to “below poverty line” (BPL) families, based on outdated and unreliable BPL lists, some of them are 20 years old.
- Further, the central contribution to old-age pensions under NSAP has stagnated at a tiny ₹200 per month since 2006, with a slightly higher but still paltry amount (₹300 per month) for widows.
- Many States have enhanced the coverage and/or amount of social-security pensions beyond NSAP norms using their own funds and schemes. Some have even achieved “near-universal” (say 75%-80%) coverage of widows and elderly persons.
- That is now the norm, for instance, in all the southern States except Tamil Nadu — an odd exception since Tamil Nadu has been a pioneer in the field of social security.
Beyond target old-age pensions:
- “Targeting” social benefits is always difficult. When it comes to old-age pensions, targeting is not a good idea in any case.
- For one thing, targeting tends to be based on household rather than individual indicators. A widow or elderly person, however, may experience major deprivations even in a relatively well-off household. A pension can help them to avoid extreme dependence on relatives who may or may not take good care of them, and it may even lead relatives to be more considerate.
Complicated formalities:
- For another, targeting tends to involve complicated formalities such as the submission of BPL certificates and other documents. That has certainly been the experience with NSAP pensions.
- The formalities can be particularly forbidding for elderly persons with low incomes or little education, who are in greatest need of a pension.
- In the Tamil Nadu sample, eligible persons who had been left out of pension schemes were found to be much poorer than the pension recipients (by more than just the pension).
- In Tamil Nadu this often means, for example, that if the applicant has an able-bodied son in the city, they may be disqualified, regardless of whether they get any support from their son. In their quest to avoid inclusion errors, many officials are less concerned about exclusion errors.
Inclusive effort:
- A better approach is to consider all widows and elderly or disabled persons as eligible, subject to simple and transparent “exclusion criteria”.
- Eligibility can even be self-declared, with the burden of time-bound verification being placed on the local administration or gram panchayat. Some cheating may happen, but it is unlikely that many privileged households will risk trouble for the sake of a small monthly pension.
- And it is much preferable to accommodate some inclusion errors than to perpetuate the massive exclusion errors we are seeing today in targeted pension schemes.
Revamping NSAP:
- The proposed move from targeted to near-universal pensions is not particularly new. As mentioned earlier, it has already happened in several States. Of course, it requires larger pension budgets, but additional expenditure is easy to justify.
- India’s social assistance schemes have low budgets and make a big difference to large numbers of people (about 40 million under NSAP). They are well worth expanding.
- The southern States are relatively well-off, but even some of India’s poorer States (such as Odisha and Rajasthan) have near-universal social security pensions.
- It would be much easier for all States to do the same if the central government were to revamp the NSAP. The NSAP budget in 2022 is just ₹9,652 crore,more or less the same as 10 years ago in money terms, and much lower in real terms. This is not even 0.05% of India’s GDP.
Way Forward:
- Social security pensions, of course, are just the first step towards a dignified life for the elderly.
- They also need other support and facilities such as health care, disability aids, assistance with daily tasks, recreation opportunities and a good social life.
- This is a critical area of research, policy and action for the near future.
Shallow-water mining for metals
(GS Paper 3, Environment)
Why in news?
- Mining metals such as gold, cobalt and copper from depths of 200 metres (m) below the sea, also known as ‘shallow-water mining’, could trigger local extinctions of marine species, a new study has highlighted.
Unsustainable practice:
- Shallow water mining was not a sustainable substitute for deep-sea mining, where valuable minerals needed to build batteries critical for clean energy transition are mined from ocean depths greater than 200 m.
- Deep-sea mining has not been implemented yet due to concerns over the environmental impacts of mining activities.
- Meanwhile, there is interest in shallow-water mining as it is considered a relatively low-risk and low-cost option to satisfy the demand for metals and minerals. Also, technology for shallow-water mining already exists.
Shallow-water mining projects:
- Namibia has been mining diamonds off its coast in depths of up to 130 m.
- Indonesia has been extracting placer deposits; sediments containing gold, silver, tin, and platinum.
- Mexico, New Zealand and Sweden have proposed shallow-water mining.
- Mexico is considering mining marine phosphorites, phosphate-rich nodules used in fertiliser and industrial chemicals, in water depths of 50-100 m.
- Sweden is interested in exploring the shallow waters (60-150 m) of the Bothnian Sea for polymetallic nodules, mineral deposits containing nickel, cobalt, copper, titanium and rare earth elements. New Zealand, however, pulled the plug on the project due to environmental concerns.
Concerns:
- Despite these developments, the impacts of shallow-water mining haven’t been thoroughly investigated.
- This could be because shallow-water mining has been on many occasions compared directly to sand and gravel extraction.
- Still, several claims, have been made about shallow-water mining being an environmentally and socially sustainable alternative to land mining without evidence.
Impacts on marine life:
- Shallow-water mining involves removing sediment-bearing minerals, which offer refuge to seafloor organisms. This could trigger local extinctions and changes in species composition.
- Also, ploughing the seafloor releases plumes, which could impact water quality.
- Other issues could be the release of harmful substances from the sediment and disturbance from noise and light.
- As shallow-water ecosystems are already under stress due to pollution, and the impacts of climate change, even seemingly small-scale mining activities can drastically affect marine ecosystems, especially at local scales.
Recommendations:
- Theresearchers said shallow-water mining activities should not be considered the “silver bullet to resolve the growing global need for metals” until the environmental and socioeconomic impacts are thoroughly investigated.
- Meanwhile, nations have not agreed on whether deep-sea mining should be permitted amid environmental concerns at the recently concluded 27th session of the Assembly of the International Seabed Authority.
Way Forward:
- The current study helps to understand the potential risks of the mining activity for deep-ocean biodiversity, ecosystems and human well-being.
