Australia’s new Governor-General has been sworn in as the official representative of the British monarch in the country.

On Monday, Samantha Mostyn was sworn in as Australia’s 28th Governor-General at an official ceremony at Parliament House in Canberra, reports Xinhua news agency.

A prominent business and community leader, Mostyn becomes the second woman to serve as Australia’s Governor-General.

Speaking after the ceremony, she vowed to bring kindness, care and respect to the role.

“These testing times call for an unstinting focus on kindness, on care and on respect,” Mostyn said.

“I will be an optimistic, modern and visible Governor-General, committed to the service and contribution that all Australians expect and deserve from the holder of this office.”

As the representative of the British monarch, currently King Charles III, the Governor-General performs constitutional duties, including formally appointing the Prime Minister and other ministers, ordering elections and giving royal assent to bills passed by the parliament.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced in April that Mostyn would replace David Hurley, whose five-year term ended on Sunday.

Mostyn, 59, started her career as a lawyer before serving on the boards of several companies, including NGOs, the Climate Council and mental health support organisation Beyond Blue.

Prior to being appointed as the governor-general, she was the chair of the government’s Women’s Economic Equality Taskforce.

She said on Monday that Australia is facing great difficulties in climate change, the cost-of-living crisis and the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic but that she feels tremendous optimism about the country’s future. AGENCIES

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa announced the lineup of his new national executive cabinet, comprising ministers from various political parties that form the Government of National Unity (GNU).

Ramaphosa on Sunday finally made the long-awaited announcement after protracted negotiations that nearly collapsed when the main opposition party within the GNU demanded additional ministerial positions, reports Xinhua news agency.

The announcement came more than a week after Ramaphosa’s inauguration on June 19 for his second presidential term. His re-election came with a reduced majority, forcing his party, the African National Congress, to share power for the first time in three decades.

This led to the formation of the GNU with ten opposition parties, such as the Democratic Alliance (DA), Inkatha Freedom Party, and Pan Africanist Congress of Azania, among others.

In his late-night televised national address, Ramaphosa declared that the economy and the stability of the government would be of top concern to the new cabinet.

“The incoming government will prioritise rapid, inclusive and sustainable economic growth and the creation of a more just society by tackling poverty and inequality,” said the President.

The DA, which garnered over 21 per cent in the recent elections, was allocated six cabinet posts. The party’s leader, John Steenhuisen, 48, was appointed minister of agriculture.

Some minor parties also saw their leaders receive cabinet posts. AGENCIES

A natural gas explosion in Turkiye’s western province of Izmir killed five people and injured at least 60 others.

According to state-run TRT broadcaster, the explosion occurred at 2:43 p.m. local time (1143 GMT) on Sunday at a business on the ground floor of a building in Torbali district.

At least 10 of the injured are in critical condition, reports Xinhua news agency.

Izmir Governor Suleyman Elban told TRT that the explosion damaged 11 buildings in the vicinity.

“As a precautionary measure, the gas supply has been cut off, and the area is being evacuated. Our security forces have taken necessary actions,” Elban said.

Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc said on X that an investigation has been launched into the explosion, with the coordination of two public prosecutors. AGENCIES

The UN on Monday released proposals to share the use of “digital sequence information on genetic resources (DSI)” — the DNA sequences of plants, animals and microbes — to support communities supporting nature.

The documents are published six weeks before nations meet in Montreal, Canada, from August 12-16 for final negotiations within the DSI intergovernmental negotiating group before the matter comes up for decision at the UN Biodiversity Conference (COP 16) in October in Colombia, US.

The goal is to equitably share revenues from products such as drugs, cosmetics, and agricultural biotechnology. However, agreement is needed on several questions, including which industrial sectors using DSI should share its benefits.

According to Co-Chairs of the negotiations, Mphatso Kalemba of Malawi and William Lockhart of the UK, the sectors that depend most on DSI generate from “one to a few trillion dollars annually;” just 0.1 per cent of US $1 trillion would yield $1 billion for the global fund; 1 per cent would amount to $10 billion.

The funds will support the conservation and sustainable use of nature, including related activities of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities, and building capacity worldwide to generate and use DSI.

“The world has been presented with an opportunity to mobilise additional resources for biodiversity conservation and sustainable use whilst enhancing benefits from the use of DSI through this mechanism and its fund. I hope that delegates will work hard in Montreal to unpack that solution to the world,” Kalemba said. AGENCIES

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Monday said that 97.87 per cent of the ₹2000 banknotes that were in circulation as of May 19, 2023, when their withdrawal was announced, have now been returned.

The total value of ₹2000 banknotes in circulation has declined to ₹7581 crore at the close of business on June 28, 2024, from ₹3.56 lakh crore at the close of business on May 19, 2023, according to the RBI’s latest update.

The facility for the exchange of the ₹2000 banknotes has been made available at the 19 Issue Offices of the Reserve Bank 1 since May 19, 2023.

From October 9, 2023, RBI Issue Offices are also accepting ₹2000 banknotes from individuals/entities for deposit into their bank accounts.

Further, members of the public are sending ₹2000 banknotes through India Post from any post office within the country to any of the RBI Issue Offices for credit to their bank accounts.The ₹2000 banknotes continue to be legal tender. AGENCIES

  The Bangladesh parliament on Sunday passed a record 7.97-trillion-Taka (68 billion US dollars) national budget for the 2024-25 fiscal year (July 2024-June 2025).

Finance Minister Abul Hassan Mahmood Ali placed before the parliament the annual budget of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government.

Unanimously by voice vote, the parliament passed the budget on the last working day of the current 2023-24 financial year with some adjustments, reports Xinhua news agency.

The inflation rate which was announced at 6.5 per cent for the 2024-25 fiscal year during the budget proposal on June 6 has been revised to 6 per cent.

Bangladesh is now targeting an average inflation rate of 6 per cent in the next fiscal year, although it averaged more than 9 per cent in the past two years. However, the government projected an economic growth of 6.75 per cent in the annual budget.

On the expenditure side, the size of the Annual Development Program (ADP) for the next fiscal year will be 2.65 trillion Taka with transport, power, infrastructure, rural development and education sectors getting the biggest chunk of money. AGENCIES

Change of mindset and exploration of regional resources are the key to build a startup ecosystem in Jammu & Kashmir, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Science and Technology Dr Jitendra Singh said on Sunday. Addressing the ‘National StartUp Conference RASE 2024’ at the National Institute of Technology (NIT) in Srinagar, the minister said the agriculture sector can be the main area of startups in the region.

Citing the example of ‘Aroma Mission’, Dr Singh said the ‘Purple Revolution’ was born in the small towns of Bhaderwah and Gulmarg, and is now being talked about countrywide.

Nearly 5,000 youngsters have taken up lavender farming as agri startups and are making handsome incomes in the region.

“Some of the youngsters working in the corporate sector have also left their jobs and turned to lavender farming. The success of the ‘Aroma Mission’ is vindicated from the fact that the example of J&K is also now being emulated by Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and some of the northeastern states,” said the minister.

Dr Singh said that the startup movement in India has picked up in a big way in the last one decade and the credit for this primarily goes to Prime Minister Narendra Modi who gave a call for ‘Startup India Stand-up India’ from the ramparts of Red Fort during his Independence Day address in 2015.

At that time, the minister recalled, the number of startups in the country was just 350-400 and today, it has gone up to 1.5 lakh and the country is rated number three globally in the startup ecosystem.

As far as J&K is concerned, it could be possible to explore the areas of agri startups in the floriculture sector too, for which the Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR) has started a floriculture mission, according to Dr Singh.

The minister also referred to handcraft, horticulture and textile startups as rich domains of J&K, saying that the Ministry of Science and Technology is committed to supporting startups in various sectors in J&K. AGENCIES

Leading health insurer Niva Bupa on Monday filed its draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) with the markets regulator Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) to raise about Rs 3,000 crore ($360 million) via an initial public offering (IPO).

The draft papers filed by True North-backed Niva Bupa Health Insurance Company Ltd have a fresh issue of Rs 800 crore for the public and an offer for sale (OFS) of up to Rs 2,200 crore by existing shareholders.

The OFS comprises up to Rs 320 crore shares by Bupa Singapore Holdings Pte and Rs 1,880 crore by Fettle Tone LLP.

Bupa Singapore Holdings has a 62.27 per cent stake in the health insurer while Fettle Tone LLP has a 27.86 per cent stake in the company.

Morgan Stanley India, Kotak Investment Capital, Axis Capital, ICICI Securities and HDFC Bank have been hired for the IPO, according to reports.

Niva Bupa would be the second stand-alone health insurer, after Star Health Insurance, to list on the Indian stock exchanges.

In September last year, leading private equity firm True North sold a 20 per cent stake in Niva Bupa Health Insurance to its partner Bupa for Rs 2,700 crore, taking the Indian firm’s valuation to Rs 13,500 crore.AGENCIES

 The overall Indian Public Cloud Services (PCS) market is expected to reach $24.2 billion by 2028, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 23.8 per cent, a report showed on Monday.

The revenue from Indian PCS market reached $8.3 billion in 2023, according to the International Data Corporation (IDC).

The PCS market includes infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS), platform-as-a-service (PaaS) and software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions.

“While enterprises continue to modernize IT on IaaS offerings, core business applications have a shifting trend to SaaS models on public cloud. These offerings are further enhanced by GenAI technologies to improve user experience and productivity,” said Rajiv Ranjan, Associate Research Director, Cloud and Artificial Intelligence, IDC India.

The top two vendors continued to hold more than 40 per cent of the India PCS market in 2023.

Public Cloud adoption in India continued to rise as enterprises preferred public cloud services for their digital transformation initiatives, application modernization, and productivity enhancements.

“Moreover, the increased focus on cost optimisation in recent times has accelerated the move towards as-a-service consumption models, thus driving public cloud adoption,” said Harish Krishnakumar, senior market analyst, IDC India. AGENCIES

 India’s manufacturing activity surges in June, hiring at 19-year high

India’s manufacturing activity picked up momentum in June on the back of rising consumer demand leading to the fastest rate of hiring in 19 years, according to HSBC’s final India Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI), compiled by S&P Global, released on Monday.

“The Indian manufacturing sector ended the June quarter on a stronger footing. The headline manufacturing PMI rose by 0.8 percentage points to 58.3 in June, supported by increased new orders and output,” said Maitreyi Das, global economist, HSBC.

The performance of the consumer goods industry was especially strong, although substantial increases were also noted in the intermediate and investment goods categories, the report stated.

Export growth is also likely to be better compared with the previous year as the 400 firms surveyed for the index recorded another month of strong growth of new export orders, with Asia, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Europe and the US being the driving economies.

Input inflation remains above the long-run average. However, manufacturers were able to pass on higher costs to customers, as demand remained robust, resulting in improved margins,” said Das.

Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal has projected that India’s goods and services exports are likely to increase by 3 per cent to surpass $800 billion in 2024-25.

Reserve Bank of India recently revised India’s growth forecast upward to 7.2 per cent from 7 per cent earlier. AGENCIES