Who is an authentic professional: responsibility of a professional in a public project

Who is an authentic professional: responsibility of a professional in a public project

debate in DNA today on the issue of responsibility of a professional in a public project. should society demand greater accountability from all professionals? is there a crisis of credibility: should professional societies redefine the  norms of a good professional practice?

Circular economy is booming when ‘take, make, faink’ is slowing down

Circular economy is booming when ‘take, make, faink’ is slowing down: http://creativityatgrassroots.wordpress.com/2013/07/14/circular-economy-is-booming-when-take-make-faink-is-slowing-down/When economic conditions are tight, one has to invent new ways of creating opportunities for a whole new generation of entrepreneurs

Circular economy is booming when ‘take, make, faink’ is slowing down

Posted on July 14, 2013 by CREATIVITYATGRASSROOTSLeave a comment

This is for the first time in the history of industrial economic development, green business ( blue economy) which looks at both biological and non biological feedback systems to be sustainable (cradle to cradle approach compatible with industrial ecology framework) seems to be doing much better than the linear, ‘take, make, faink (dispose)’ economy. During the last five years, circular economy generated 100 bn pounds of growth in UK while the rest of the economy was in dumps. What does it mean for India? We need to stop learning from the dominant industrial model which treats externality as a problem of government, society at large and even nature.

It is not surprising that grassroots innovations invariably use recycled parts in designing various solutions,  and not surprisingly  they fail to meet the regulator’s outdated parameters of certification. While talking at different fora recently, I made several suggestions which can give  fillip to circular economy such as:

A.      We should urgently take up the reform of regulatory and approval  systems such as transport so that vehicles, farm machinery like santi, handiyo, and other improvements using old parts can be tested and approved for road worthiness. The same would apply to many other domains where second hand parts  are used.

B.      Imagine Indian economy without a distributed repair and service economy. No other country might get more out of any product or service than India. Yet, where are the skill development courses which focus on reduce, recycle, reuse, and what I call rejuvenation. Different components of any machine, say an airplane, fatigue at different rates and thus have different functional lifes. The airplane may be junked in about 25 years but the plane’s seat may have a life of two hundred years. Why should these chairs not be refurbished and sold as household furniture. This is what Lufthansa did. The policy implication is that different components should have a fatigue factor marked on them and there should be an actively induced rejuvenation policy of these long lasting components. Devices having second hand parts should be tested of course like any other device and then encouraged if found fit, which is likely.

C.      There should be local, regional, national and global waste exchanges with all the characteristic properties and then awards announced for finding  new applications for the same to reduce environmental complications. Platforms like Techpedia.in can play an active role.

D.      Special funds should be created to invigorate a circular economy at decentralised level. It will help not only to generate environmentally positive outcomes but also to generate more enterprises and in turn jobs. Alongside the District Innovation Fund, we should create in each district, a social and environmental fund. If a government has money to subsidise food for wealthy people, they certainly have funds to promote social, environmental and economic start ups in each district.

E.       Local language databases of used parts of different kind must be made available at each ICT kiosk and with mobile apps to every mobile user so that the circular economy can get a boost and right away.

F.       The invigoration of the informal economy will take place in a big way when rural and semi-urban mechanics and roadside urban mechanics will know about a whole range of components available for reconstitution, reassembly, redesign and rejuvenation. The students of  IITs and  polytechnics can do tagging and characterisation of these components and make the databases more interactive and informative.

G.     When economic conditions are tight, one has to invent new ways of creating opportunities for a whole new generation of entrepreneurs. These waste, component, tool and devices exchanges will fertilise the imagination of the younger generation. The India Inclusive Innovation Fund will of course ignore all such opportunities but hopefully some empathetic leaders in the public and private sector will see the potential of the circular economy.

H.      Patents both live and expired, relating to these components and waste materials, will be pooled and used to annotate the entries in the databases.

I hope that the circular economy will forge new kinds of partnerships between formal and informal sectors and create new entrepreneurial pathways of socially inclusive development.

ramadan may be blissful

ramadan may be blissful to all those who already have compassion in heart or are looking for it, be kind, forgiving and accommodative of the differences, or disputes that can be transformed into opportunities for navigating inner silence

should we give our family name to children?

Decades ago when it was time to give names to our children, we decided not to give our family name to them. I did not know whether i would have any influence at all in life. But i/we were to have, i/we did not want our children to have any advantage of it. Children have sort of liked it. I thus agree that more and more young people should stop using caste identification in their name. 

in this context, it is a welcome intervention of Allahabad high court questioning the legitimacy of caste based mobilization, a very controversial foray of judiciary. But a well intentioned one ...

four ways of learning from and for innovation

http://creativityatgrassroots.wordpress.com/2013/07/13/four-ways-of-learning-for-innovation/

The exchange of knowledge between formal and informal sector can take place at different levels of abstraction:

The most basic level is the artefactual level, i.e. adaptation of form, features, and functions of a product, process, service or institutional design.

The next level is the analogic/metaphorical level implying learning by approximation. Not the exact concept but its derivation in some form or function is drawn upon. For instance bio-mimicry has been applied for self-cleaning surfaces like the lotus leaf.

Learning can also take place through heuristics/principles underlying an innovation. This kind of rule of thumb learning can be used in far wider domains. For example, any plant that is not eaten by cattle or other animals could be a potential source of herbal pesticides.

On a gestalt/configurational level, learning requires looking at a combination of factors responsible for an innovative situation. Such factors could be technological building blocks, institutional arrangements and cultural values. In some parts of the world, people make a bridge by joining roots of the trees growing on two sides of the river. This technology of bridge making requires collective action in the local cultural context. Learning on this level requires a unique combination of different factors contributing to a viable solution.

There are many gaps in our social, institutional and cultural context due to policy or procedural inadequacies. Sometimes, these gaps are also caused by absence of appropriate innovations. Another reason for these gaps could be our inability to adapt frugal solutions available elsewhere in the world to our needs. When these solutions emerge in the informal sector and through the efforts of common people, the barriers to learning from them become even stronger.

Challenge:

Take any one local unmet social or institutional need e.g. with regard to the elderly, children, disabled, unemployed) and try to come up with innovative solutions using one or a combination of the four ways of learning. In case you have another way of learning, you are welcome to use that so long as it helps to find innovative solutions.

Inovation Clubs in all universities, colleges and polytechnics: 

President of India's mission to set up National Innovation Club ( presidentofindia.nic.in/sp070313-1.html ) in each central university finds new scale up in Karnataka. Congratulations

Siddaramaiah ( CM, Karnataka) proposed establishment of Digital Knowledge Centres in public libraries. He also wanted 'innovation clubs in all universities, colleges and polytechnics.'

Read more at: http://news.oneindia.in/2013/07/12/no-big-ticket-incentives-for-it-in-siddaramaiah-budget-1258264.html
http://dce.kar.nic.in/Files%20NRR/Genenral/Openenig%20of%20Innovation%20Clubs%20at%20Colleges.PDF

The government also proposed to set up incubation centres for ICT sector in collaboration with engineering colleges in selected district headquarters to encourage entrepreneurship and innovation in this sector.

Read more at: http://news.oneindia.in/2013/07/12/no-big-ticket-incentives-for-it-in-siddaramaiah-budget-1258264.html