Speed Post News Network
New Delhi : As part of Indo-Danish bilateral Green strategic partnership, India is all set to take a giant leap towards building a world class innovation ecosystem as Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) of India’s premier policy think tank NITI Aayog and Embassy of Denmark to India on April 12, 2021, officially announced their collaboration.
Under this ambitious partnership, Innovation Center Denmark in India will collaborate with AIM to support various current and future initiatives of AIM, NITI Aayog, and its beneficiaries in India as well as develop global innovation Green economy partnerships addressing SDG goals, according to a PIB release.
A Statement of Intent (SoI) was signed between AIM, NITI Aayog, and Embassy of Denmark to India, here on NITI Aayog premises. The purpose of SoI is to jointly work towards promoting innovation and entrepreneurship amongst the aspiring entrepreneurs. The partnership would be executed through Innovation Center Denmark (ICDK) under the aegis of Embassy of Denmark.
Vice Chairman NITI Aayog Dr Rajiv Kumar while lauding the step said, “I look forward to this collaboration very much and hope that whatever we do, we will also focus on water use in agriculture that takes up to 92 percent of the water. I hope with this collaboration we can bring something very innovative in this field as well besides the others.”
The partnership between India and Denmark holds great potential said CEO NITI Aayog Amitabh Kant while sharing his thoughts on the occasion. “For impactful innovation across multiple sectors, this partnership upholds a great potential. Through such global collaborations, we can align research and development efforts to achieve results in an accelerated manner even in these challenging times,” he asserted.
Freddy Svane, Denmark’s ambassador to India, in his address, said that water is a substance that cannot be replaced and we need to use all kinds of innovative thinking to make use of it so that the future generations do not face a lot of water challenges as compared to current scenario.The ambassador stressed on three key and crucial points : Water, Women, and the World. He said, “water is the stream of life hence its importance for present and future generations cannot be stressed enough. Women empowerment is key to the growth of a nation and to the sustainability goals of the World. If we do not solve water management and challenges issue, regardless of the location, it will impact lives across the world.”
Svane stressed on the 10 innovations that Denmark and India recently identified through the water innovation challenge that was organised in collaboration with AIM. He said the 10 innovations would play a crucial role in solving water issues and many such innovation collaborations should be taken up through this partnership to address a wide range of issues. He also said that the collaborations would also allow Danish innovations to work on addressing water issues faced in India.
AIM-ICDK shall also explore various areas of collaboration such as AIM-Denmark school students innovation exchange and co-innovation development, hosting Indo-Denmark innovation challenges, facilitating startup-incubator collaborations and exchanges, and promotion of startup and entrepreneurship events and competitions through the networks and channels of both parties.
AIM and ICDK have previously collaborated to host AIM-ICDK Water challenge and the SoI between the two would pave the way for such future collaborations that allow innovation exchanges between two countries.