20.10.22

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is working on a series of improvements to the NavIC, or Indias equivalent of the Global Positioning System (GPS), so that more people are motivated to install it and use it. Plans are also afoot to make its reach global rather than circumscribe it to India and a limited territory around it.

NavIC ( with Indian Constellation), or the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS), is a constellation of seven satellites that is akin to the American GPS, the European Galileo and the Russian GLONASS, and can be used to track location. The first of these satellites (IRNSS-1A) were launched in 2013 and thelatest in 2018.

Currently, NavIC satellites orbit earth in a geostationary or geosynchronous (GEO) orbit, or about 36,000 km from earth. MEO orbits occupy a space between GEO and Low Earth Orbit (LEO), or about 250-2,000 km from earth.

UN Climate summits are held every year, for governments to agree steps to limit global temperature rises.

They are referred to as COPs, which stands for “Conference of the Parties”. The parties are the attending countries that signed up to the original UN climate agreement in 1992.

COP27 is the 27th annual UN meeting on climate. It will take placein Sharm el-Sheikh from 6 to 18 November.

This will be the fifth time a COP has been hosted in Africa.

The region’s governments hope it will draw attention to the severe impacts of on the continent. The IPCC says Africa is one ofthe most vulnerable regionsin the world.

Currently,UNFCCC.int/is-eastern-africas-drought-the-worst-in-recent-HISTORY-and-are-worse-yet-to-come/”>17 million people are estimatedto be facing food insecurity in east Africa because of drought.