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Current Affairs 31 August 2020
Daily Current Affairs 31 August 2020: This post contains the latest current affairs for 31 August 2020 that are important for all competitive exams like Bank, SSC, IBPS, SBI exams. You can improve your general knowledge with our daily online current affairs. You can also read the daily current affairs on our mobile app.
National News
Piyush Goyal Attends 8th East Asia Summit (Economic Ministers’ Meeting)
- The 8th East Asia Summit (Economic Ministers’ Meeting) was held virtually on 28 August 2020, to strengthen the regional supply chains, become resilient during this challenging time of Covid-19 pandemic, and to spur economic growth.
- The meeting was attended by the Economic ministers from the 10 ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) members and eight other nations, including India, the US, China, Japan, South Korea, Russia, Australia and New Zealand.
- The East Asia Summit 2020 was chaired by Vietnam’s Industry and Trade Minister Tran Tuan Anh.
- The Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Shri Piyush Goyal represented India in the Summit.
- The meeting concluded with a joint statement in which the ministers reaffirmed their commitment to promote trade and investment, minimise disruptions to trade and global supply chains and facilitate supply chain connectivity, including for essential goods such as medical supplies, medicines, including vaccines, food, commodities and other essential supplies and services in the region.
IT Minister Ravi Shankar launches Next Generation Start-up Challenge Contest “Chunauti” to boost Startups
- The Union Minister for Electronics and IT Shri Ravi Shankar Prasad has launched a next-generation startup contest named `Chunauti’.
- Aim: to further boost startups and software products with special focus on Tier-II towns of India
- Total Outlay: Rs 95 crore
- Duration of the programme: Three years
Key Features of the Chunauti Programme
- Under the programme around 300 startups, working in identified areas, will be selected and then given seed fund of up to Rs 25 lakh and other facilities create new software products and app.
- Identified areas include:
- edu-tech, agri-tech and fin-tech solutions for masses;
- supply chain, logistics and transportation management;
- infrastructure and remote monitoring
- medical healthcare, diagnostic, preventive and psychological care;
- jobs and skilling, linguistic tools and technologies
- Other facilities includes: incubation facilities, mentorship, security testing facilities, access to venture capitalist funding, industry connect as well as advisories in legal, Human Resource (HR), IPR and patent matters
- The selected startups will be offered various support from the government through the Software Technology Parks of India(STPI) centers across India.
CISF launches mobile app ‘Pension Corner’ for its retired personnels’
- The Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) has launched a mobile application ‘Pension Corner’ to cater to the needs of all its retired personnels.
- The in-house built app has been developed as part of an e-office initiative introduced in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Some important features of the app are:
- The app is available on both web and Android platforms.
- Includes an SMS invitation system to keep pensioners connected to the CISF for any important events happening at their nearest CISF unit across the country
- Inbuilt grievance redressal mechanism
- All important circulars like job opportunities and benefits relating to pensioners will be available on the app
International News
New Zealand’s stock exchange (NZX) resumes trading after cyberattacks
- New Zealand’s Exchange (NZX) which operates New Zealand capital, risk and commodity markets (stock market) was under cyber attack for four days.
- It was a “distributed denial of service” (DDoS) attacks. However, the source of attack is not known yet.
World Bank pauses “Doing Business” report over data irregularity issue
- The World Bank has stopped the publication of its “Doing Business” report to probe data collection irregularities in the annual ranking of countries’ business and investment climates.
- The World Bank said that there were “a number of irregularities” reported regarding data changes to the reports published in 2017 and 2019.
- World Bank would conduct a systematic review of data changes in the last five Doing Business reports, and independent auditors will probe data collection and review processes.
- The last Doing Business report was published in October 2019 in which India was ranked 63rd while New Zealand was on top.
Ranking
Amul (16th) becomes first Indian dairy company to be in Rabobank’s Global Top 20 list; Top- Nestle
- Amul, Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF) has been ranked 16th in the Rabobank’s Global Top 20 Dairy Companies list. Amul has achieved an annual turnover of $5.5 billion.
- Switzerland’s Nestle topped the list with a turnover of US $22.1 billion. Amul is the first Indian company to enter the top 20 ranking of Rabobank’s Global Top 20 Dairy Companies list.
Business News
Reliance buys Kishore Biyani’s Future retail for Rs 24,713 crore
- Reliance Retail Ventures Limited (RRVL), subsidiary of Reliance Industries Limited will buy Kishore Biyani’s Future retail for Rs 24,713 crore.
- The first step in this acquisition will be the merger of five Future Group’s listed entities including Future Retail, Future Lifestyle and Future Consumer – into Future Enterprises (FEL).
- FEL will then sell the retail, wholesale business, logistics and warehouse business as a slump sale to Reliance Retail and Fashion Lifestyle Limited (RRFLL). RRFLL is a subsidiary of RRVL which in turn is a subsidiary of Reliance Industries Limited.
- This acquisition is subject to SEBI, CCI, NCLT, shareholders, creditors, and other requisite approvals.
Military Exercise
India withdraws from multilateral military exercise, Kavkaz 2020, in Russia
- India has withdrawn its participation from the multilateral Military Exercise Kavkaz 2020 to be held in Russia between 15th to 26th September 2020.
- The reason for this has been cited as the COVID-19 Pandemic and consequent difficulties in exercise, including arrangements of logistics.
- Kavkaz 2020 would be held in Astrakhan province of Southern Russia where member countries of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) and Central Asian countries would be participating.
- Other countries that would participate in this exercise are- China, Pakistan, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Mongolia, Syria, Iran, Egypt, Belarus, Turkey, Armenia, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan.
Sports News
Lewis Hamilton wins F1 Belgian Grand Prix 2020
- Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes-Great Britain) has won the Formula One Belgian Grand Prix 2020 held on August 30, 2020. This was his 5th win of the season.
- Valtteri Bottas (Mercedes-Finland) came second followed by Max Verstappen (Red Bull – Netherlands) at third place.
India, Russia announced joint winners of FIDE Online Olympiad 2020 (Chess)
- India and Russia have been jointly annouced the winner of first-ever FIDE Online Chess Olympiad 2020. This was the first time FIDE was holding the Olympiad in an online format.
- India were initially declared to have lost the final round against Russia. Two Indian players (Nihal Sarin and Divya Deshmukh) were declared to have lost on time in the final round after an apparent loss of internet connection for them.
- After this, FIDE President Arkady Dvorkovich had made a decision to give gold medals of to both teams.
Arsenal beat Liverpool on penalties to win 2020 FA Community Shield
- Arsenal beat Premier League champions Liverpool by 5–4 on penalties to claim the 2020 FA Community Shield after a 1–1 draw.
- The annual football match was played between the winners of the previous season’s Premier League, Liverpool, and the previous season’s FA Cup, Arsenal, on 29 August at the Wembley Stadium in London.
- Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored the goal for Arsenal while Takumi Minamino scored for Liverpool.
- This is the 16th time that Arsenal is winning the Community Shield title.
Obituary
‘Black Panther’ star Chadwick Boseman passes away at 43
- American actor Chadwick Boseman, who became a global icon for his role as Black Panther in the hit Marvel superhero franchise, has passed away after battling cancer since past four years from 2016.
- He was 43.
- Chadwick made his Marvel superhero debut as T’Challa/Black Panther in 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, after which he became a household name.