July 2019 – Dev Kusum Foundation

Nurture neglected businesses

The world of possibilities is so large that one institution cannot possibly plug the gap. We need to widen the ambit of R&D in a manner which is a win-win situation for all

Forest wealth is one of the biggest assets for India. It needs application of principles, creativity and innovation in the same scale and intensity as has been done in the larger R&D section of manufacturing and services. Application of the principles of subtraction, modification, addition, alteration and more of the creativity process to the sequence of modification of the produce will add value to the product. To illustrate, substracting the content of sulphur in hydro carbon products makes the petrol less polluting. The principles of creativity and innovation do not end with such transformations alone. They include practices of attribute listing, forced matching, synectics and the list can be long.

The inability to institutionalise these interventions on forest products like tamarind and chiraunji among others has come in the way of product value addition. It is everyone’s loss — from the general public, who would have gained from the medicinal property of tamarind to the gatherer, who gets less remunerative prices.

It does not need a genius to realise that Sal […]

It’s only about word play

For a solution to be effective, it doesn’t have to be new. It may be buried in some past practice. Discovering that is not innovation

The world of social movements is full of clichés. Every self-proclaimed thinker (or otherwise), takes it upon himself/herself to coin a few phrases and add that to a growing stream of cacophony. Consider phrases like “caring liberalism”, “mainstreaming” and “people-centric solutions” and the list can go on. Of course, these phrases can be defended and they should be. Question, however, is a matter apart. Have such phrases produced any evidence of making human life more bearable, if not liveable?

The current era is of capitalism. Hence, any movement for a minority alternative will pitch for the opposite. Consequently, it can be fashionable to posit capitalism versus whatever else, asking for space for compassion. One should pause to ask how capitalism becomes the opposite of compassion or indeed vice versa? When some thinkers from the US talk of “aggressive competitiveness”, it becomes fashionable to start talking about “cooperation.” The simple proposition is, in this circular planet, examples can be found for anything.

Even that can be overlooked. The tragedy is a whole template is created pleading for the opposite of […]

Monthly Archives: July 2019

Nurture neglected businesses

It’s only about word play