Debanjana Dey

Science and policy are human constructs to understand biodiversity. This paper attempts to review the relationship between science and policy for biodiversity in India. It has been found that sciences and policies/programmes for biodiversity were shaped by national objectives and commitment to global and transnational goals for the planet's well-being, where biodiversity is an integral part of planetary well-being. The paper also shows how utilitarianism marked both research as well as policies and programmes with respect to biodiversity. Biodiversity conservation demands policies that are not just about economic gains within a plan period, but about larger conservation, threats to survival (species extinction), and inter-generational time scales. Given the global emphasis on biodiversity conservation particularly in the context of climate change and food security, country like India needs to balance multiple demands and multiple stakeholder's interests. The relationship between science and policy for biodiversity Post independence in India has converged for increasing utility from natural resources and simultaneously increasing human wellbeing. There is a need for biodiversity policy in the country to be fed by robust science and different knowledge forms where biodiversity is understood not only as a species or breed to be conserved but the system's heterogeneity and the ontology of biodiversity to ensure sustainability.

This paper presents an exploratory analysis of India’s livestock sector using the sectoral innovation systems (SIS) framework, given that the livestock sector has all the features of a SIS (Malerba 2002). The purpose of this paper is to (i) understand the livestock sector through a SIS framework, and (ii) explore if the SIS framework is adequate to analyse and explain all the challenges faced by the livestock sector. The livestock sector has its own knowledge base, technologies, inputs and demand, and has very specific organizations, learning processes and competencies, some specifically nurtured by appropriate public policy. By applying the SIS framework, the paper would take into account the system components, the functions and performance, as well as the institutions or rules that govern them. The paper argues that the SIS framework does help us understand the organizations (structures, actors, agents, firms) and the functions within a sector. But in order to enable continuous learning and change for sustainable development, and to address emerging challenges faced by crop-livestock
systems, like loss of biodiversity or grazing common lands, there is a need to look beyond the SIS framework. It is important to explore the institutions that govern the different domains of the SIS components. These institutions, as the paper demonstrates may have had little to do with the economics or history of the sector itself, its knowledge base or competencies, but may have become dominant institutions governing the actors or organizations within the sector. This paper is an attempt to rectify some of that missing attention to the institutions that shape a SIS, and thereby take the SIS analyses and the innovation systems framework itself, a little beyond an economic ‘sector’. Thus, the need is to look beyond SIS conceptualization and encourage learning opportunities to create sustainable SISs.

This paper argues that what we do to conserve biodiversity depends on how we know biodiversity. The former Chair of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) is concerned that national policymakers may not take the findings of this global assessment (GA) seriously because of 'squabbling scientists.' The paper explores the contentious issues in IPBES, about presenting knowledge to policymakers, and about the integration of indigenous and local knowledge (ILK) into this global scientific knowledge creation. It asks why IPBES fights shy of addressing the dialectical relationship between how we know and how we act on the environment. Given that biodiversity is best understood and conserved by local communities, we present a case study of the protocols or policies of the Maldhari community in the Banni grasslands in India. The institutions or norms of the Maldhari 'way of life' govern and co-create their knowledge and policy decisions or protocols for biodiversity and livelihoods. The IPBES conceptual framework places these institutions that govern knowledge generation and policy-making outside and distinct from the direct drivers of nature and human well-being. If IPBES findings are to be taken up by nation states, we need astute policy makers who understand institutions and are capable of public engagement and co-creation of knowledge and policy. The paper makes a plea for building on the IPBES report with national and local public engagement, to enable knowledge-policy relationships of co-ownership and action for biodiversity conservation.

This article presents an understanding of innovation in the Indian context by considering the relationship between firm size and innovation. This is based on a major study on innovation where survey of Indian firms was undertaken by the research team to understand the process in the Indian context. In this article the focus is on the relationship between firm size and propensity to innovate. The interesting observation is that the small-sized firms focus mostly on minor or marginal innovations which are either not recognized or go unnoticed in the market. The purpose behind such initiatives is to enable them to sustain in the market. This brings in an interesting dimension of the process of innovation where the firms innovate not to create market, but to sustain themselves in the market. The article presents variation in the innovation activities amongst the firms depending upon their size.

This report is based on the survey at a national level, which is not about identification of innovations that is happening in Indian
industries only but about understanding the process that makes innovation happen or constraints innovation from happening. The understanding is through developing and examining a set of indicators that would help promoting and monitoring innovation in Indian production system.

This study was undertaken to look into the process that has enhanced dynamism and facilitated the build-up of S&T capabilities in China and Korea. The study has analysed the S&T policy framework of both China and Korea to identify the relationship between their achievements and policy architecture, in order to derive lessons for India.

The process of innovation from start to end involves numerous factors to equip the firms' in the initial period and also wide variety of business practices later for successfully propagating the innovation. Few firms traverse this terrain while few fail to. To ascertain whether size acts as a deterrent to reach innovation or not, this paper tries to examine few relationships from the findings of Indian National Innovation Survey and to put forward certain policy initiatives in this direction. The main finding explains that most large firms with higher workforce base show more propensity to innovate than the firms with lesser workforce. It also brings out an interesting aspect for the small sized firms who innovate only to create its own niche in the competitive market conditions. The innovations by these firms are mostly petty innovations which are either not recognized or goes unnoticed in the market which calls for certain policy initiatives for the overall upbringing of these firms within an enabling innovative environment.

In India, in the month of May, 2019 the leaking of genetically modified Brinjal into a farmer's field in Haryana led to uprooting the entire field to remove the traces of it (Bera, 2019), depicting a typical case of indecisiveness of policy makers with the available genetically modified (GM) crops and the uncertainty associated with the technology. The indecisiveness is due to ethical tensions that arise from differences in interests, values, power and rights among the different stakeholders. This book edited by Harvey James Jr. explores the ethical tensions that agricultural biotechnology and GM food creates by arguing the benefits of agricultural biotechnology to improve food system while advancing the interests of humans, animals and the environment and at the same time raising the ethical concerns without being blinded by the assumption of inherent efficiency of technological innovation. This volume, a collection of twelve essays, is a compendious statement of ethical questions that creates 'fault lines and pressure points' with respect to new technologies particularly agricultural biotechnology and GM food. The essays have mainly addressed four domains-public opinion and public interests; policy and regulation; relationship between new technologies and the social, economic or environmental problems; and interaction between new and old technologies, in an attempt to ameliorate the ethical tensions and to use agricultural biotechnology to improve food and food systems.