NISAR Mission

What is NISAR and its mission?

• NISAR is a Low Earth Orbit observatory jointly developed by NASA and ISRO which is expected to be launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota onboard ISRO’s GSLV Mark-II launch vehicle.
• NISAR’s mission life is for three years and the satellite will survey all of earth’s land and ice-covered surfaces every 12 days.

Data Provided by NISAR observatory will help researchers monitor a wide range of changes in unprecedented detail which includes:

1. Spotting warning signs of imminent volcanic eruptions
2. Helping monitor the effects of groundwater use such as land subsidence
3. Tracking the melt rate of ice sheets tied to sea level rise
4. Observing shifts in the distribution of vegetation around the earth

What are ISRO and NASA aiming to achieve with the NISAR satellite?

NISAR : it stands for NASA + ISRO +SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar )

• SAR’ is a type of remote-sensing technology that uses radars instead of optical sensors to create high-resolution images of the earth’s surface. It can penetrate clouds and vegetation to generate accurate data.

What NASA and ISRO plans to accomplish through NISAR Mission?

1. Disaster mapping:

• A collection of pre-disaster images will be used to better understand disasters and inform official policy on the best courses of action in future. Satellite observations will also be uninterrupted by weather, thus providing quick and reliable information for rescue operations and loss estimates.

2. Changes in permafrost:

• NISAR will be programmed to observe global changes in permafrost at regular intervals, updating scientists about its degradation, with implications for global water resources, aquatic ecosystems, coastal water levels, etc.

3. Forests:

• Forests provide timber, fuel, and a variety of products, act as carbon sinks (sequestering excess carbon in the atmosphere), purify air and water resources, and are habitats for multiple plant and animal species. NISAR will monitor global forest resources, their extent, and quality and provide information for their sustainable development and management.

4. Agriculture and food security:

• SAR imaging of crop rotation, growth, and harvest can be used to streamline planned agricultural output and monitor the health of crops.

Maldives and Lakshadweep

How do the two groups of islands compare as tourism destinations?

• The Maldives is an archipelago of 1,190 coral islands and sandbanks clustered in 20-odd atolls, sprawls over a patch of North Central Indian Ocean southwest of Kerala and Sri Lanka. Male, the capital Maldives, lies about 600 km southwest of Thiruvananthapuram.

• Whereas Lakshadweep is a group of 36 coral islands having a total area of only 32 sq km. The islands which are at a distance of 220 km and 440 km from Kochi, lies to the north of the Maldives. Both archipelagos are part of the same chain of coralline islands that extends southward beyond the equator to the Chagos archipelago.

How many tourists visit Lakshadweep currently?

• There is no updated official data available on this, but the numbers are negligible compared to other tourist destinations in India. As per India Tourism Statistics 2019 published by the Union Ministry of Tourism, Lakshadweep accounts for a statistically zero share of the total revenue generated out of tourism in India.

How do these numbers compare with those for the Maldives?

• Data on the website of the Maldives Ministry of Tourism show 1,01,626 tourists had arrived in the country until January 17 in 2024 — almost 6,000 arrivals per day on average.
• Since the Covid-19 pandemic, tourists from India have constituted the largest share of visitors to the country. As per government data more than 2 lakh tourists from India visited Maldives in 2023, accounting for 11.2% of arrivals in the country. In 2022, 2021, and 2020 too, Indians had the largest share of arrivals at 14.4%, 22.1%, and 11.3% of the total respectively.

How did the Maldives become such an attractive destination for tourists?

The Maldives has a history of investment in tourism. As per Maldives tourism master plan 1996-2005 the tourism sector has been “the most important economic activity” in the country since the 1980s.Tourism directly contributes almost 30% of the country’s GDP, and generates more than 60% of its foreign currency earnings.

• Connectivity: The country is serviced by 40 carriers from around the world, including Air India, Vistara, and IndiGo that fly to Male from Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Kochi.
• Free Visa at Arrival: The Maldives offers visa-free arrivals to its major source markets, which include India, Russia, China, and Kazakhstan.
• Marketing: As per World Bank, in 2020 Maldives launched a marketing campaign with the tagline “Isolation never looked this good” to emphasize its unique reputation of being a niche destination, while emphasizing environmentally sustainable tourism.
• Digital Infrastructure: Maldives invested heavily in digital technology as the demand for high-speed internet and contactless services rise due to the pandemic. In Maldives, more than 60 percent of the population has access to broadband Internet—with relatively high bandwidth speed—while other tourism-dependent South Asian countries are still lagging limiting the possibilities to meet travellers need for working remotely.