 A very good evening aspirants, welcome to the hindi news analysis brought to you by Shankara ice academy. Today we are going to cover the hindi news edition dated 24th of March 2022. And today I have taken 4 important news articles for discussion and fortunately all these are important from problem's perspective and in many of these topics we will be discussing certain sub areas that could be a potential problem's question. So pay attention to the discussions because I also have a quiz question at the end. Now let us get to the first discussion of today. So we are going to start our discussion with this news article. It talks about the brand audit report of 2021. See this is a report that documents plastic wastes and this is documented to identify companies that are responsible for plastic pollution. So we can see that this report is a much needed one from the environmental perspective. So today we are going to discuss about this report and its findings in detail. We will also see few types of plastics. See because plastics is an important UPSC topic especially it is very much relevant from problems as well as main's perspective. For example if you look at these two questions one of this appeared in 2019. It is on microbeads as you know microbeads is a small pellet of plastic. So there is a question on microbeads. And even last year in 2021 we had a question that asked about what kind of plastic has bisphenol A and since plastic has several environmental concerns it is going to be news always and it is going to be a hot topic in every year's exam. So in this manner this report is important for us. Let us see that now. Before that the syllabus relevant to this discussion is given here for your reference. Firstly first of all note that brand audit report is a data driven citizen led initiative and the 2021 report has been named as Unrapped and this 2021 report was conceptualized by Break Free from Plastics BFFP. So what is this BFFP? It is a global movement that envisions a future which is free from plastic pollution. So the BFFP has financed the India brand audit report of 2021. And just know that the brand audits are conducted annually by the members of Break Free from Plastic Movement across the globe. And the report on India has been conceptualized and created with the help of many NGOs. So basically it is a report of BFFP along with several other organizations. Now in the beginning I said that in this report plastic waste is documented but how is it documented? This is done by counting and documenting the brands that are found on plastic waste. Now once these brands are found then using that we can easily identify the companies that are responsible for plastic pollution. So to be specific this is mainly done to hold the corporate polluters accountable for their indiscriminate use of single use plastic packaging. What are single use plastics? These are the disposable plastics and it includes items which are intended to be used only once before they are thrown away or recycled. Especially the single use plastics are the plastics which are commonly used for plastic packaging so it includes items such as grocery bags, food packaging, bottles, straws, containers, cutlery etc. So even though the government has banned the use of single use plastics even now many branded companies use it. And to identify them only this brand audit is conducted. Like what is the actual methodology for load to collect the plastic waste? See they collect the plastic from household waste and also from public places. And then data on each piece of plastic is recorded. Here the data will be like you know brand name, parent company, product type, plastic resin type or whether it is a single or multi layer plastic etc etc. These will be recorded and based on that only we have many findings. Now the first important finding is that out of the total plastic waste that was audited across India around 70% had a clear consumer brand and only 30% were unbranded. So we can say that major brands are responsible for single use plastic pollution. Actually the brand audit has named many of these brands. In the international perspective it has given the international polluters. This includes the companies like Unilever, PepsiCo, Coca-Cola Company, Nestle etc. And if you come to Indian polluters the top Indian polluter is Parli and then comes ITC Limited, then Britannia, then Haldiram etc. So just note that these brands are generating more plastic wastes. This was the first finding. Now the second finding is over 60% of all the plastic items that were found were actually used for food packaging. So the major source of plastic pollution comes from food packaging. Now among food packaging also the milk packets alone accounted for 25% of plastic items. And here you can see other major sources of plastic waste. So these two findings majorly answer our question of what is the source of plastic waste? Or where from the plastic is generated? But now the question is what type of plastic is actually found? As per the findings, multi-layered plastics made up 35% of all plastic wastes. So what are multi-layered plastics? So these are typically composed of multiple layers that is different types of plastics. Sometimes they are even along with metal or paper. So multi-layered plastics are composed of several different layers and types of plastic paper and metal. Now these multi-layered plastics are lightweight and they have high volume. So it is expensive to sort them and aggregate and transport. And particularly note that this is a non-recyclable plastic at a commercial scale. Why? Because recycling this material requires the layers to be separated from each other. That is the layer of plastic, metal and paper to be separated. And this is currently not possible at a commercial scale. So actually how these multi-layered plastics are being dealt with? Majority of them are collected under extended producer responsibility and sustainability commitments. And they are sent to cement kilns for incineration or for some waste to energy plants or they are even sent to pyrolysis plants. But they are not sent for recycling. But you should remember that there are some initiatives that are attempting to recycle or upcycle multi-layered plastics. And as of now they remain at the pilot phase and are yet remaining unproven at a commercial scale. So that is why multi-layered plastics hold the most part of plastic waste. Then what are the other types? In other types we have the PET that is polyethylene terephthalate. Then we have high density polyethylene. In short HDPE we have low density polyethylene or LDPE. We also have PP which stands for polypropylene. And then we also have the PS which stands for polystyrene. And from this representation you can easily say that this audit report has found that LDPE is at the second level that is it is the next dominating type of plastic waste. So this is the next important finding. So what is this LDPE? It stands for low density polyethylene as I already said. Now this is a soft flexible lightweight plastic material. And it is also noted for its low temperature flexibility. It has toughness and corrosion resistance. But note that this LDPE is not suited for applications where stiffness, high temperature resistance and structural strength are required. And that is why these are typically used in food packaging. As you can see in this image you can see these simple plastic covers and the covers that are used on packaged breads. These are made up of LDPE. But the problem is that LDPEs are often contaminated with wet waste when they are discarded. So it makes it challenging to sort, store and clean the LDPE. And that is why even though these are recyclable plastics, they are still rejected from the recycling stream many times. Now on one end we have the LDPE. On the other end we have HDPE. It is the high density polyethylene. Now this HDPE is a thermoplastic polymer which is made from petroleum. Now it is used in plastic bottles, milk jugs, shampoo bottles, bleach bottles, cutting boards and piping. So you can understand that it is quite strong. So HDPE is known for its outstanding tensile strength. And it also has a large strength to density ratio. Plus they have a high impact resistance and high melting point. And that is why they are used as food and beverage containers. See remember LDPEs are used as food packaging covers. But here the HDPE is used in containers. There is a difference between covers and containers right? But major advantage with HDPE is that it comes under the widely recycled plastics. That is these HDPE products can be recycled back into the same product a few times. And then after that they are downcycled and then they end up as pollution. So what is downcycled means here we are referring to downcycling. See downcycling is converting waste into lower quality products. And then it often cannot be recycled. For example in this image you can see these plastic bottles. These are HDPE. Now these can be converted into some kind of clothes. And then it is finally dumped as waste in the landfill. So this process is called as the downcycling plastics. So these were few facts that you need to know about plastic waste. Now in order to reduce the plastic waste in India the report has also recommended certain suggestions. First of all it asked the companies to internalize the true cost of plastic production and plastic pollution and invest in sustainable systems. It also recommended companies to reveal how much plastics was being produced and imported. And it also advised the companies to redesign their packaging systems and delivery systems. And fourthly it is the major suggestion. It has asked the companies to stop the promotion of chemical recycling and co-processing as alternatives. See what is chemical recycling? It usually refers to the technologies that breakdown used to plastic with the combination of heat pressure, depleted oxygen, catalyst, solvents etc. And they are made into either fuel or building blocks for new plastic. You will think that recycling term is only used when the processes turn the plastic back into plastic. But the problem is the petrochemical industries refer to the processes which produce fuel as chemical recycling or even they call it as advanced recycling. So here the plastic is turned into something else. And some of the processes that are used would be you know pyrolysis, gasification etc. So simply chemical recycling is the process of chemically breaking down polymers into monomers. Now on the other hand we also have co-processing. The term co-processing refers to the use of waste materials in industrial processes as alternative fuels or raw material to recover energy. So here the waste material would be the plastic waste. Now the problem with chemical recycling and co-processing is if they are legitimized then these processes will give the plastic producers a license to continue the indiscriminate production of non-recyclable plastics and low-value plastics. So in turn these will have long-term negative environmental impacts as well as health impacts. And that is why the report has asked the companies to stop the promotion of chemical recycling and co-processing as alternatives to proper recycling. And last recommendation given by them is the companies are asked to invest in reuse and refilling infrastructure systems. Along with this they have been also asked to build capacities of informal waste workers so that they could be used in the reuse and refilling infrastructure systems. That is the report has asked the manufacturers to seriously acknowledge and respect the waste pickers as equal partners because they only help the companies or the manufacturers in collecting all the plastic packaging which is the actual plastic waste. So these were some of the suggestions given by the report to reduce plastic waste in India. Now from this discussion itself you would have understood that it is quite important from mains perspective because we not only saw the issues with types of plastics but we also saw how to overcome that issue. So overall what we saw is brand audit report is a data driven citizen led initiative and the 2021 report is called Unwrapped and this brand audit is the product of a global movement called Break Free from Plastics. And through this they identify the companies that are responsible for plastic pollution. And according to the 2021 findings 70 percentage of plastic waste had clear consumer brand. And in India the top consumer brands that create plastic waste are Parle, ITC Ltd, Britannia, Haldiram etc. And then it was also found that around 60 percentage of plastic items were used for food packaging particularly for milk packets. And among the type of plastics multi-layered plastics were at the top and then comes the low density polyethylene. And we also saw what are multi-layered plastics and low density polyethylene. Then finally we saw some of the suggestions of the report like revealing how much plastic is being produced and imported then redesigning the packaging systems then stopping the promotion of chemical recycling and co-processing etc. So these are the few points that you have to remember from the exam perspective. Now let us get to the next discussion. Now our next discussion is based on this news article. It mentions that a request has been made for the implementation of article 355 in the state of West Bengal. See this request was made by a looks above congress leader through a letter written to the president of India. Now this has been requested due to the complete broken law and order situation in Birbhum district of West Bengal. Now we are not going to see the issue here rather we are going to see what is this article 355. First let us see what the constitution says. As per article 355 it is the duty of the union to protect every state against external aggression and internal disturbance. So what is an external aggression? It is the you know attacks by foreign entities but on the other hand internal disturbance means a riot prison break disruptive terrorism widespread strike etc. So in such a scenario it will be the duty of the union to protect every state. Along with this the union should also ensure whether every state government is carried on in accordance with the provisions of the Indian constitution as per this article 355. Now you may ask what will happen if union government finds that a state government is not carrying on duties in accordance with the provisions of Indian constitution or what will happen if there is some external aggression or internal disturbance in a particular state. Now in these scenarios what the union government will do is it will invoke the emergency provision of article 356. Yes you are right this provision is also called as the president's rule or state emergency or constitutional emergency. So article 355 leads to article 356. So how and when this emergency rule or president's rule is initiated? See first consider the situation of a state government which cannot be carried on in accordance with the provisions of Indian constitution. Now at this situation the president receives a report from the governor stating the situation. At this time article 356 is proclaimed. In other words we can also say that whenever under article 355 the state is found to perform against the constitutional provisions then article 356 is proclaimed and not only this whenever a state fails to comply with or to you know give effect to any direction from the center then also the president can proclaim a state emergency or the president's rule. So from example's perspective let us briefly see how this article 356 or the president's rule is implemented. See firstly the function of the state government are vested in or it is exerciseable by the governor or it could be exerciseable by anybody or any authority in the state other than the legislature of the state. And secondly the powers of the state legislature are exerciseable by the parliamentary authority or it is exerciseable under the parliamentary authority and here note that the president cannot assume any of the powers vested in or exerciseable by the high court therefore president cannot also suspend the operations of any provisions of the constitution that is relating to high courts. So even in the president's rule that is in a constitutional emergency situation high court's powers are not suspended. But note that the proclamation of article 356 that imposes president's rule must be approved by both the houses of parliament remember both the houses and this has to be done within two months from the date of its issue that is the date of issue of the proclamation. Now if the proclamation is approved by both the houses of parliament then president's rule continues for six months. It will not be for an unlimited time period rather it only continues for six months. But this can be extended for a maximum of three years and this could happen only when there is a parliamentary approval after every six months. So in this discussion we saw what is article 355 remember article 355 you know it is what leads to article 356 so we can say article 355 is a warning provision and in the article 356 the powers of the state are taken by the parliamentary authority. So with these points in mind now let us get to the next discussion. Now we are going to our next discussion this is going to be an important one from the prelims perspective. See in this discussion we are going to cover so many subtopics that are quite relevant from the science and technology area of our syllabus and as you know UPSC is notoriously famous for asking questions regarding space technologies and space exploration missions. So in this way this discussion is going to be an important one. So what this article talks about this text and context article is talking about the Artemis one mission of NASA. The article talks about the mission in detail its trajectory and also about the future missions under the Artemis program. So we will see all these today but you may think why are we covering such a topic and that too in detail. It is because as I already said UPSC is famous for asking detailed technology related questions especially the space technology. Look at this 2016 and 2020 question. Now this question is from Astrosat and here you can see it has talked about the weight of the satellite and all and where it will be placed exact distance above the earth's surface. These kinds of minute details have been asked in the prelims examination and in 2020 a descriptive question was asked where a mission was explained and then you had to choose the correct answer and this can only be done if you know about the mission clearly and that is why we are going to cover the Artemis mission of NASA in detail. So this is the syllabus. Let's get to the discussion. See Artemis is the name of moon goddess in Greek mythology. So you would have guessed that Artemis is a mission around moon. Actually Artemis one mission is the first in a series of complex missions that will enable human explorations to the moon as well as to the Mars. Actually Artemis one mission was formerly called the exploration mission one. I said it is a mission of NASA right but it is a collaborative mission of NASA with other space agencies. We'll see what are these space agencies later in the discussion and the Artemis one will be the first integrated test of NASA's deep space exploration systems and the systems that will be tested here are the Orion spacecraft and the space launch system rockets. So now we are going to understand what do we mean by deep space and the deep space exploration systems. We'll also see about Orion spacecraft and the space launch system rockets. As a subtopic these all are important in problems. Now first comes the deep space. See the meaning of deep space is a space well outside Earth's atmosphere. Now this deep space is generally considered as the part that is lying beyond the Earth-Moon system. The International Telecommunication Union defines deep space as a space that starts at the distance of 2 million kilometers from the Earth's surface that is approximately 0.01 astronomical unit from the Earth's surface. So let us recall what is an astronomical unit. AU is the average distance between Earth and our Sun which is around 150 million kilometers. So the exploration of this deep space will be called the deep space exploration. Now in this image you can see the different phases of Artemis mission. Actually up until now NASA was in phase zero. This phase involved research and testing on the International Space Station and the Artemis one mission which we are discussing today is the start of phase one and this phase one involves missions in Cis-Lunar. What is Cis-Lunar? It is a space between Earth and Moon. Along with this more importantly the phase one will also involve setting up of deep space gateway and it will initiate the assembly of deep space transport. Now here what is this deep space gateway? For this you have to first look at this representation. This kind of looks like the International Space Station right? Actually it is a concept art of deep space gateway. Now this piece of space equipment will be orbiting the Moon and it is critical component in NASA's Artemis program and this gateway will be an outpost that will be orbiting the Moon. This gateway will also provide vital support for long term human lunar missions. It will also provide support for the staging point for deep space exploration. That is this gateway will be orbiting the Moon and it will act as a rest stop for future deep space exploration. Particularly the experiments that will be conducted here will help the NASA to send the first human to Mars in the coming years. Along with this the Artemis program will also involve setting up a space base camp. See just now I said that the deep space gateway will orbit around the Moon but this Artemis base camp will be set up on the lunar surface itself. See this image here you would have seen something like this in our sky frame movie right? This is how the space base camp will look like. So this base camp will literally be the stepping stone to Mars and beyond in our solar system. And note that this base camp will be established as a permanent outpost at the lunar south pole. Especially it will be established in our around the Shackleton crater. So Shackleton crater is related to lunar south pole. Remember this fact. Plus this base camp will also help the future astronauts in many ways. Like it will help them in utilizing the Moon's resources. This will be called as the in situ resource utilization. Then it will also help in establishing sustainable power during the lunar day or night cycles. See here sustainable power is necessary for future long term lunar missions. Along with this the base will also help in building machinery and electronics that work in Moon in the extreme environments. See in the future humans and robots will explore the lunar surface and for that they will require some special lunar terrain vehicles right? But assume that we are building lunar terrain vehicle on earth and transporting it to the Moon. Obviously this will cost us more. That is why this base camp will be used as a manufacturing hub for such kinds of machinery and electronics. And particularly now humans have the 3D print technology. With this in hand building machinery and electronics like in a sky fight movie will actually happen in real time during our lifetime itself. Now along with all this the base camp will also help to carry out lunar surface excavation and future lunar construction duties. So these are some of the ways in which the base camp will be useful. And so far we saw about the phase 0 and phase 1 of NASA's deep space exploration plans. In the future we will learn about phase 3 and phase 4. Now let us come back to Artemis 1 project. So remember it is an uncrewed lunar space mission. Or we can say it is an unmanned lunar space mission. And this mission will test working of two main systems as I already said. These are the space launch system rocket and the Orion capsule. So let us see about SLS rocket. Space launch system rocket or SLS rocket is the most powerful rocket in the world right now. This SLS rocket is a super heavy lift launch vehicle that provides the foundation for human exploration beyond Earth's orbit. It has unprecedented power and capabilities and in this manner SLS is the only rocket that can send Orion space capsule along with astronauts and cargo directly to the moon on a single mission. You can see the details about this rocket here. As you can see it will be a 322 feet tall rocket and it will be the second tallest rocket ever built. But note that this will be shorter than the rocket that was used during Apollo mission of NASA which put man on the moon if you remember. This rocket was the Saturn 5 rocket. But according to the details SLS rocket has more thrust. For example it produces a thrust of 8.8 million pounds. If you compare this with ISRO's most powerful rocket that is GSLV Mach 3 it just produces 260,000 pounds of thrust. And even in the cargo capacity SLS rocket can carry more cargo it can carry around 27 tons of cargo. On the other hand our GSLV Mach 3 can carry just 4 tons of cargo and that too only up to the geostationary orbit. So that is why this rocket is special. This SLS rocket actually has two solid boosters and these boosters will be fueled by PBAN that is polybutadiene acrylonitrile. So remember polybutadiene acrylonitrile is related to fuels for rockets. Now this will provide 75% of vehicles thrust during the first two minutes of flight. And next in the core stage of the rocket there is a super cool liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen fuel which is required for RS25 engines. See this RS25 engine is a liquid fuel cryogenic rocket engine and the propulsion for SLS core stage will be provided by four RS25 engines. And in total the core stage that is the four RS25 engines will burn for 480 seconds. This means just in eight minutes the core stage will put the Orion capsule in orbit. Now here I have also given you a video about this. You can just see it for better understanding. After this core burns off the interim core propulsion stage will separate the Orion spacecraft from the core stage. Now this stage is powered by RL10 engine. See RL10 engine of the ICPS that is interim core propulsion stage is a liquid oxygen or liquid hydrogen based propulsion system. It will give Orion the thrust that is needed to leave the earth's orbit and travel towards the moon. And within two hours from the launch the Orion and the service module will separate from ICPS and they will head towards the moon to continue with the Artemis space mission. So what is the service module? This bottom part is what we call as the service module and the top part is the crew capsule or the module that will be used in the future missions and it will house the astronauts. Here note the term future missions why I'm saying it because currently it is an unmanned mission. Now the service module serves as a storehouse of critical subsystems and supplies that are required for the mission. For example it houses the electrical systems environmental control and propellant tanks. The service module also has the rocket engine that is needed to guide the spacecraft into the lunar orbit and then send it back to the earth. Particularly the service module of Orion spacecraft is designed by the european space agency. As I already said Artemis is a collaborative mission of NASA. So european space agency is providing the service module that has been named as Esprit and the canadian space agency has committed to provide advanced robotics for the gateway. Along with this the Japan aerospace exploration agency is also a part of this mission. It plans to contribute habitation components and logistics resupply. So these were few facts that you need to know about SLS rocket, ICPS and the service capsule. Now let's come to the Orion spacecraft. See it mainly has three main components. They are the crew module service module and the spacecraft adapter. We just now saw about the service module. Now this crew module is the pressurized part of Orion spacecraft. This is where the crew will live and they will work on their journey to the moon and back. Now the another component which is spacecraft adapter. This is the one that will attach the Orion spacecraft to the space launch system rocket that is SLS rocket. So these are the facts that you need to know about SLS rocket and the Orion spacecraft. Now coming to the trajectory of Artemis one mission. See this spacecraft that is the Orion spacecraft will fly around 100 kilometers above the surface of the moon that is this is the place number nine is the place where the Orion spacecraft will fly around and by flying close to the moon the Orion spacecraft will use the moon's gravitational pull to propel itself into an opposite deep orbit which will be around 70,000 kilometer from the moon and here it will stay for approximately six days. See the main aim of you know staying at this position 10 is to collect data and to allow the mission controllers to assess the performance of the spacecraft. After this the spacecraft has to re-enter the earth's atmosphere. For this the Orion spacecraft will do a close flyby within less than 100 kilometers of the moon's surface that is in this 13th position and then it will use both the service module and the moon's gravity to accelerate back towards the earth. So that means Artemis one mission will end with the spacecraft's ability to return safely to the earth and here the service module will usually burn out during the atmospheric re-entry. So the Artemis one mission especially the Orion spacecraft is expected to safely return to earth. So these are the technical facts that you need to know about the Artemis one mission. Now overall what is the significance of this mission? First the learnings from this mission will help NASA to conduct a manned moon mission which NASA is planning to undertake by 2024. Now the significance of this 2024 manned moon mission is that here NASA is planning to land the first woman on the moon and the first person of color on the moon and secondly the mission and its findings will help NASA to establish the deep space gateway and Artemis base camp. So this will definitely help in future deep space exploration. Eventually the learnings from Artemis program will be utilized to send the first astronauts to Mars also and more importantly in the future NASA is also planning to collaborate with commercial and international partners and it is planning to establish the first long-term presence on the moon. So in this way it also becomes economically significant why because according to a report the global space tourism market size is projected to reach 2500 million by 2027. See as of 2020 it was just 800 million US dollars but the market size is expected to increase by 2027 and that is why it becomes economically significant also. So overall through the mission of Artemis NASA aims to contribute to scientific discovery and inspire a new generation of explorers. So these are the few facts that you have to remember about the Artemis one mission. Now in this discussion I have told you many facts let us recall them now. Artemis is a mission that will enable human exploration to moon and the Mars remember that and it is a collaborative mission of NASA that will involve other agencies like Canada Space Agency Japan Space Agency etc and Artemis one is the first integrated test of NASA's deep space exploration. We saw what is a deep space it is a space beyond the earth moon system that is it starts at a distance of 2 million kilometer from earth surface and now with Artemis one mission phase one of the mission has been started and the missions will be conducted in CIS Luna that is a space between earth and the moon and here they will also set up deep space gateway. This gateway will orbit the moon it will be an outpost in a way that it will act as a rest stop for future deep space explorations. Then along with this a space base camp will also be set up on the lunar surface it will be a permanent outpost at the Luna South Pole especially at Shackleton crater. So in this manner it will help in carrying out in situ resource utilization it will help in establishing sustainable power it will also help in building machinery and electronics such as special lunar terrain vehicles. It may also lead to lunar surface excavation and construction duties. Then we saw about this space launch system rocket that is SLS rocket it is a super heavy lift launch vehicle it will send Orion space capsule along with astronauts and cargo directly to moon it is a second tallest rocket ever built it has a powerful thrust of around 8.8 million pounds it can carry around 27 tons of cargo. We saw that it is much better than our most powerful rocket which is DSLV Mk3 and it will have two solid boosters they will be fueled by PBAN. Then at the core stage the fuel will be a super cool liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen fuel for the engines of RS25 and then after the core stage we have the interim core propulsion stage here RL10 engine will be used and in this engine liquid oxygen or liquid hydrogen based propulsion system is involved. Then regarding the Orion spacecraft we saw that it has a service module crew module and a spacecraft adapter and the spacecraft will fly around 100 kilometer above the surface of moon and at the end of the mission the spacecraft is expected to return to earth safely and finally we saw the significance of the Artemis 1 mission first from the learnings of the mission a manned mission to the moon will be possible by NASA and it will also help in future deep space explorations like sending astronauts to Mars and it will also help commercially as it can boost the space tourism market. So these are few points that you have to remember regarding the Artemis 1 mission. See even though this was a long discussion remember that each and every subtopic we discussed is important in problems. So these points in mind let us now move on to the next news article discussion. So our last article discussion is going to be based on this article from the business page according to it India's merchandise exports has reached 400 billion dollars in the financial year 2022. Here merchandise exports means goods exports. Now note that India set a target of achieving 400 billion dollars of merchandise exports and now before the end of the current financial year we have achieved this target. Actually India faced a dip in exports in financial year 2021 due to the pandemic but this year it has bounced back stronger. Now this is a significant achievement but still India's balance of trade has remained negative. What is balance of trade? It is the difference between exports and imports and note that currently the balance of trade of India is standing at 154 billion US dollars. So these are the facts from the news article. Now from an exam perspective we are going to see some more facts regarding merchandise exports and we will also see significance of exports. Now before that remember that why I have taken this topic is because in economics we have had questions on this area. For example in problems 2020 this question appeared here you can see there was direct statements about India's exports and imports particularly regarding merchandise exports and imports there were two statements and that is why it is important for us to know data regarding this. As we already saw India has reached 400 billion US dollars merchandise exports. Now the significant contribution to the merchandise export was provided by engineering products, apparel and garments, gems and jewelry and petroleum products and in case of agriculture also both basmati and non basmati varieties have achieved 90% and 100% of export targets. In addition to rice, marine products, wheat, spices and sugar has also seen a significant increase in exports. So according to the Ministry of Commerce and Industry this will put India in a favorable position in the ongoing negotiations for free trade agreements with several trade partners. Now keeping these facts in mind let us know why we focus on exports that is why is it important. See increasing exports will help India to bridge the gap between imports and exports definitely. So if this gap is bridged then it will bring down India's negative balance of trade which India is currently experiencing as I said in the beginning and secondly India's exports especially the increasing exports will bring in foreign exchange into the economy. Now this will help India to increase its forex reserves so in this manner we can avoid economic crisis like the one which Sri Lanka is currently facing. In addition to this exports are also an important driver of economic growth. See exports will help create much needed jobs for India's growing workforce. This could be already seen from our Asian neighbors because exports played an important role in transforming our neighbors like South Korea, China, Taiwan and Japan. So India can also replicate that and can achieve higher growth and good employment opportunities. Now particularly export of goods are an injection into the circular flow of income. This will lead to rise in aggregate demand and it will lead to an expansion of output. So this in turn helps to raise poor capital incomes which in turn will reduce extreme poverty especially in a developing country like India. Now along with all these when export increases the revenue and profit that is earned by industries will also increase so with this increased profit the businesses will make additional capital investment. So this will lead to an accelerator effect in the economy and we also know that higher investment increases the country's productive capacity which then again increases the potential for exports. So this works like a cycle. So these are some of the advantages of increasing exports. In this discussion we saw some facts related to India's exports especially merchandise exports and we saw the significance of increasing exports also. So with this discussion let's move on to the next session which is the practice questions discussion session. So now let us take up this first question. The question reads as consider the following statements with reference to the type of plastic wastes. First statement is polythylene terephthalate used to store carbonated drinks can be recycled. Now the second statement is about LDP and third statement is about HDP. Now just here you can see the difference between all these three. Now coming to the first statement it is correct the PET bottles you know they're used to store carbonated drinks and they can be definitely recycled. Now let us come to the second statement low density polythylene is very rigid and has high impact resistance. See in the name itself it mentions low density. So from that itself you can easily say this is an incorrect statement. So low density polythylene is soft flexible lightweight plastic material whereas HDP is the one that has high rigidity and high impact resistance. So the moment you know that statement two is incorrect you can arrive at the correct answer. Why because we already saw statement one is correct and from the given options you can say statement three is also correct because all the options have statement three and now two is incorrect. So the correct answer to this question is option c one and three only let us see what the third statement is. High density polythylene has high melting point this is correct we saw this during discussion itself. So correct answer is option c. Now let us take this pair based question on one side certain space missions of different space agencies have been given and on the other side the name of the space agency is given we have to choose the correctly matched pair. Now the first pair is Selene European Space Agency. Now this is an incorrectly matched pair because Selene is a lunar orbiter of Japanese space agency which is JAXA that is Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. So first pair is incorrect. So from this you can eliminate options a and c. Now let us come to the second pair smart one NASA. Now this is also an incorrect pair because smart one is also a lunar orbiter but it is the lunar orbiter of ESA that is European Space Agency. Now if you know this you can arrive at the correct answer which is option d because we have eliminated option b also. So option d is none of the above which means none of these pairs have been correctly matched. Selene is the product of JAXA smart one is the product of ESA and Changi too is the mission of China that is Chinese National Space Administration CNSA. This mission has a lander and the mission will also return with lunar samples. Now L-Cross is a mission of NASA it is an impactor mission. So all these are incorrectly matched that is why correct answer is option d. Now let us take up this next question with reference to economic survey 2021-22 Arrange the given sectors in the decreasing order of contribution to India's merchandise exports for the financial year 2021. So we have to arrange these sectors in the order of contribution to India's merchandise exports and the order should be in the decreasing manner. That means highest contributing sector has to be in the first. Now for this we have to see the data. Now here you can see the percentage share of total exports of each sector from this we can say that petroleum product should be in the first it should be followed by drug formulations biologicals then comes pearl precious stones etc then iron and steel and finally electrical machinery and equipment. So order should be one four two three and five which is given an option c that is why correct answer is option c. So with these questions I also have quiz question for you it is a polity based question so attend this question carefully and you can post the answer in the comment section and if possible also say why a statement is right or incorrect. So with these discussions I am ending today's in the news analysis don't forget to like comment and share and also if you have not subscribed to our channel please subscribe for receiving regular updates on UPSC preparation thank you