INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS
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A Curtain Raiser Event for the Founding Ceremony of the International Solar Alliance (ISA) was held at Bonn, Germany on November 13, 2017.
i. The event was addressed by Anand Kumar, Secretary, Union Ministry of New and Renewable Energy and C.K. Mishra, Secretary, Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Government of India.
ii. Interim Director General of the ISA, Upendra Tripathy, informed that ISA will become a treaty-based international intergovernmental organisation on December 6 2017.
iii.Three programmes of ISA that are currently underway include, Facilitating affordable finance for solar energy, Scaling up solar applications for agriculture and Promoting solar mini-grids in Member Nations.
iv. During the event, discussions were also held on ISA’s Common Risk Mitigation Mechanism (CRMM) project, aimed at de-risking investments into solar energy projects.
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About International Solar Alliance (ISA):
♦ The International Solar Alliance is an alliance of more than 121 countries which are located completely or partly between Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn.
♦ It was jointly launched by the Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi and the then President of France Francois Hollande in November 2015 in Paris, on the side lines of COP21.
10th South Asia Economic Summit held in Nepal
10th South Asia Economic Summit (SAES) begun in Kathmandu, Nepal on November 14, 2017.
Highlights of 10th South Asia Economic Summit, Nepal:
i. Theme of this summit: “Deepening Economic Integration for Inclusive and Sustainable Development in South Asia”.
ii. It has been organised by National Planning Commission and Ministry of Commerce of Nepal and South Asia Watch on Trade, Economics and Environment, Nepal.
iii. 200 participants including ministers, government officials, researchers, eminent experts and thinkers will attend this three-day long summit.
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About South Asia Economic Summit (SAES):
♦ South Asia Economic Summit (SAES) was started in 2008.
♦ It is a regional platform for discussing and analyzing economic and development issues and challenges faced by South Asian countries.
♦ Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), Bangladesh; Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS), India; South Asia Watch on Trade, Economics and Environment (SAWTEE), Nepal; Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI), Pakistan and Institute of Policy Studies of Sri Lanka (IPS), Sri Lanka are the five think tanks that are actively involved in this platform.