-The Hindu The U.K., South Africa and Brazil variants have been currently detected in 86, 44 and 15 countries respectively, India being one of them. The government on Thursday issued a fresh set of travel guidelines, with India reporting the presence of U.K., South Africa and Brazil mutant variants of the SARS-CoV-2 which have demonstrated increased transmissibility, as reported by the World Health Organization. All the three have been currently detected in...

-Livemint.com Growth in exports, easing inflation, and higher manufacturing activity have lifted India to the top half of Mint’s Emerging Markets Tracker for the first time in four months India climbed five spots to attain the third position among key emerging markets in January, the latest update to Mint’s emerging markets tracker shows. Rising exports, falling inflation, and greater manufacturing activity boosted India’s rank in January although it still remains a few...

School meals ensure nutrition for millions of vulnerable children across the world. Almost 370 million children worldwide are covered by school feeding programmes. While 100 million school children benefitted from the noon meal scheme in India prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, countries like Brazil (48 million), China (44 million), South Africa (9 million) and Nigeria (9 million) too run similar programmes for school children. However, an estimated 39 billion in-school...

-Down to Earth UN agencies urged governments to prioritise school reopening More than 39 billion in-school meals were missed globally during the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic due to school closures, according to a new UNICEF report. Since the beginning of the pandemic, nearly 370 million children have not been receiving a school meal in 150 countries, said the report by UNICEF Office of Research and the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP)...

Large dams that cause environmental degradation and large-scale displacement, among other things, have been opposed in India by civil society organisations (CSOs), such as Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA), National Alliance of People's Movement (NAPM) and People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL). A recently published study by the United Nations University's Canada-based Institute for Water, Environment and Health along with other partner organisations reveals that tens of thousands of existing large...