1) 1st Ministerial Meeting of India-EU Trade and Technology Council: It will lay the roadmap for cooperation and provide direction to achieve desired outcomes. Three Working Groups will collaborate under the mechanism:
- Working Group on Strategic Technologies, Digital Governance and Digital Connectivity
- Working Group on Green and Clean Energy Technologies
- Working Group on Trade, Investment and Resilient Value Chains
2) Phase out Methane Emissions by 2030: Recently, Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, the President-Designate of COP28 has called upon the oil and gas industry to phase out methane emissions by 2030, as methane have emerged as a critical concern in the fight against climate change
- Role of Hydrocarbons in Energy Transition from Methane:
- Hydrocarbons can play a transitional role during the shift to new energy systems
- They can serve as a bridge fuel between high-carbon fossil fuels and cleaner alternatives
- Hydrocarbons contribute to maintaining energy system stability during the initial phases of integrating intermittent renewable energy sources
- Infrastructure for extracting, processing, and distributing hydrocarbons is already existing
- Efforts should focus on minimizing the carbon footprint of hydrocarbons
3) E-Invoicing and Curbing Tax Evasion: Recently, the Government has lowered the threshold for businesses to generate e-Invoice for Business-to-Business (B2B) transactions, from Rs 10 crore to Rs 5 crore with the aim to curb Tax Evasion and increase compliance under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Regime
- The government has also rolled out the Automated Return Scrutiny Module (ARSM) for GST returns in a backend application for central tax officers. This helps tax officers to scrutinize the GST returns of Centre Administered Taxpayers who are selected based on the risks identified by the system
