Project Report on National Competitiveness in Knowledge Economy

Description
Competitiveness pertains to the ability and performance of a firm, sub-sector or country to sell and supply goods and services in a given market, in relation to the ability and performance of other firms, sub-sectors or countries in the same market.

Deliverable I

Project on “National Competitiveness in Knowledge Economy
Developing a framework for collaborative linkages to meet emerging challenges”

Report incorporating recommendations based on the findings of five years’ work for use by the government as input for making necessary policies and programmes for the knowledge economy

Sponsored by : Department of Information Technology Government of India

Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee Indian Institute of Technology Madras International Management Institute New Delhi National Productivity Council New Delhi

Project on “National Competitiveness in Knowledge Economy
Developing a framework for collaborative linkages to meet emerging challenges”

Report incorporating recommendations based on the findings of five years’ work for use by the government as input for making necessary policies and programmes for the knowledge economy 1. The Project

The Department of Information Technology sponsored a project on “National Competitiveness in the Knowledge Economy” to be executed jointly by four institutions, namely, Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT-M); Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee (IIT-R); National Productivity Council (NPC); and International Management Institute (IMI), New Delhi. The Project commenced in March 2006 and was completed in March, 2011.

The Project had a Steering Committee headed by Prof. Ashoka Chandra, Principal Advisor, IMI and Chairman, Centre for Management of Innovation and Technology (CMIT) of IMI. The Committee had members drawn from the four partner institutions, Senior Officials of DIT and selected experts. The Steering Committee had eleven meetings over the duration of the Project. DIT had set up a Project Review and Steering Group (PRSG) under the chairmanship of Prof. Ashoka Chandra with members drawn from partner institutions, DIT and experts from outside. PRSG met eight times during the Project period. The progress of work carried out by the partner institutions, inter-alia, was duly reported to the Steering Committee and PRSG in their meetings.

2. Objectives of the Project
Following were the broad objectives of the Project:
i. ii. Mapping the directions of transition from industrial economy to knowledge economy. Developing strategies of change management for transformation from industrial age to information age.

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iii.

Identifying new knowledge streams/disciplines likely to emerge in the evolving knowledge economy and suggesting specialized courses to help meet manpower requirements of the knowledge economy.

iv.

Generating deeper understanding, among key stakeholders, of the scope and significance of Knowledge Technology, R&D and Innovation management for the emerging knowledge economy, and developing model course-curricula for adoption by other knowledge institutions.

v. vi. vii. viii. society.

Anticipating trends and identifying issues for formulating policy initiatives. Preparing policy recommendations for efficient, smooth and speedy transformation. Creating a network of Knowledge Institutions and Promoting the use of Knowledge Management as a tool for securing larger good of the

3. Project Components
The project had been mandated to have the following components.
(1) National level Symposium – one. (2) International Conferences – two. (3) National/State/Local level Seminars, Conferences, Workshops, Consultations, Competitions, Brainstorming Sessions, etc. – thirty. (4) Commissioned Consultancies and Reports – ten/twenty. (5) Working model/framework for active collaboration and synergy amongst industry, government and society. (6) Identification of courses for manpower development for DOEACC in the emerging knowledge economy. (7) Workshop on draft policy directions. academia,

4. Deliverables
• Report incorporating recommendations based on the findings of five years’ work for use by the government as input for making necessary policies and programmes for the knowledge economy. • A template for collaborative and cooperative synergy amongst Industry-AcademiaGovernment-Society for realizing a knowledge economy. This will be a well researched model for use by various stakeholders after customization at their end. • Report identifying new streams/disciplines for the emerging knowledge economy.

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Document outlining short courses/MDPS in Knowledge, Technology, R&D and Innovation Management for key decision makers.

5. Final Workshop

With a view to evolving and finalizing policy directions, the final workshop on “Towards A Knowledge Economy” was organized at IMI on 18-20 November, 2010. All the four participating institutions presented the work done by them under the project.

In addition to circulating reports of research studies, a number of papers written especially for the Workshop were circulated. The four partner institutions made presentations on the work done by them and recommendations were brought out. The recommendations were discussed at the Workshop.

Thereafter the Recommendations were compiled and put together as a document. They were drawn from :
? ? ? ? Discussions at the Workshop Research studies carried out under the Project Seminars and workshops organized under the Project Published literature viz. books and papers in professional journals

? Reports of international agencies 6.
Recommendations for use by the government as input for making necessary policies

and programs for the Knowledge Economy.

These recommendations relate to a number of areas as given below: i. Education and Training Higher Education Expansion of higher education requires increased funding which should not be viewed as an but as investment in human resources. While public investment in higher education should be increased “to at least 1.5 per cent of GDP”, it is essential that it should be supplemented adequately by private investment.

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Education system needs to be flexed to facilitate horizontal and vertical movement of students, for which a National Qualification Framework needs to be developed. As a knowledge economy, India should be producing human capital which has global employability. Educational programmes should have international comparability and degrees should have international recognition.

For improving quality of teachers and thereby education, research is an important element for teacher resource development. Therefore, research should be encouraged and supported in institutions of higher education.

In order to make the educational institutions work together, sometimes government should proactively require them to collaborate, develop and institute specific strategies for the purpose, and fund collaboration. In order to make education relevant to the needs of the industry and society, institutions should bring in professionals from the field to act as adjunct faculty/trainers for contextspecific skills/knowledge.

Education

should

develop

entrepreneurship

attitudes/orientation

and

project

implementation capabilities, and institutions should develop entrepreneurial culture. For providing opportunities to those who are living in remote areas or are in employment, non-formal modes such as distance education, open learning systems and e-learning should be used more extensively. For enhancing transparency, possibility of registering educational institutions under Section 25 of the Companies Act should be examined. Primary/Secondary Education Following the commitment made in the Constitutional Amendment Article 21A, school education needs to be expanded to operationalize the Right to Education. Expansion of education requires infrastructure and teachers. Training of teachers is not a one-time task. Teachers need to refresh and upgrade their skills periodically.

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Government must provide the additional financial resources required to ensure the Right to Education. Educational system should include alternate systems of education (e.g. madarsas) also. School education is aimed at building a basis for acquiring further knowledge/skills. It should not be linked merely with employment opportunities. Vocational Education/Training Vocational coverage of TVET should be enlarged. “Potentially, the target group for skill development comprises all those in the labour force, including those entering the labour market for the first time (12.8 million annually), those employed in the organized sector (26.0 million) and those working in the unorganized sector (433 million in 2004-05). The current capacity of the skill development programs is 3.1 million. India has set a target of skilling 500 million people by 2022.” To meet this target, massive expansion of training facilities is called for. Vocational education should be linked with employment. For identifying streams of training and formulating curricula, training needs analysis needs to be carried out. There is a paucity of trained instructors. Appropriate training needs to be imparted to potential instructors and their salaries and service conditions need to be reviewed to attract the right persons to this profession. Vocational education often leads students to a dead end. Opportunities should be opened for them to move to higher levels of education and training. For this purpose, a National Qualifications Framework should be developed. Apart from other roles, NQF should accommodate prior learning. A system of accreditation should be evolved to accredit instructors, examiners, training programs and training centres. This is required for improving and ensuring quality.

Vocational education should be competency based. A system of competency testing and certification should be developed. This will be most useful for informal sector workers training and entrepreneurs.

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Vocational training may have to be provided largely to those who do not know or are not comfortable with English or Hindi. Therefore, instructors should be fluent with local language and training material should be provided in local language. This would also require extensive documentation and translation facilities. Traditional skills should also be documented.

Infrastructural facilities already developed for previously popular professional courses should be utilized for needed skill development.

The feasibility of using educational cess for specific exposure to knowledge economy issues should be looked into. ii. R&D and Innovation India’s rank in the Economist Group’s Global Innovation Index for 82 countries was as low as 58 in 2006; it rose marginally to 56 in 2008 and is predicted to be 54 in 2013 (EIU, 2009). This shows that we have a long way to go. Therefore, policies should be re-oriented to accelerate R&D and innovation in the country.

Ways have to be found to attract bright young people to R&D. One of the problems with R&D career is low salaries and benefits. The other problem is with R&D management which instead of inspiring and offering exciting challenges, dampens the spirit of young and aspiring people. These issues need to be looked into.

Most of the funding for R&D in India comes from the Government and goes to public funded institutions e.g. universities and research institutes. The proportion of industrial R&D is relatively much smaller. Measures should be taken to promote industrial R&D. In this context, possibility of PPP may also be examined.

With a number of high level institutes and research labs. coming up, efforts should be made to forge international linkages. Such collaboration will improve the quality of domestic research projects as well. Despite a good beginning made in recent years in the direction of IPRs, a massive effort for awareness development and training for IPRs is called for.

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There is a great deal of traditional knowledge that exists in the country. Benefits of such knowledge should go to those who possess that knowledge. Mechanisms should be evolved for that purpose. As in developed countries, there should be interchangeability of R&D and teaching personnel. Ways should be found to provide stability to both at various levels.

As a policy thrust, government should explicitly direct research institutes, universities, and other publicly funded institutes of learning to do more to address the needs of the poor An important means of encouraging inclusive innovation is to support grassroots innovation networks and indigenous/traditional knowledge initiatives and to promote and diffuse innovations by grassroots indigenous/traditional knowledge entrepreneurs (UNESCO, 2010). We should encourage setting up of R&D labs. in educational campuses with the participation of industry.

Teachers should be allowed to set up their firms for R&D, e.g. in R&D parks in the vicinity of educational institutions. It is necessary to provide training in innovation management to scientists especially when they reach senior levels.

For R&D to flourish in any area, a critical mass is essential. We should build up facilities and personnel in chosen areas so that a critical mass will be available.

R&D in any field is dependent on other fields also. Thus, for undertaking R&D in a given field, research in related fields also has to be built up. R&D should not be limited to developing technology-based products. It should also be undertaken to develop technologies. For India to become an R&D hub, we have to foster a global outlook. Therefore, we should facilitate people from other countries to come here and open up our system for investment, employment and ownership.

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iii. Networking For a networking initiative to be successful, there has to be a strong commitment. Key decision makers have to be convinced about the advantages of networking. They have to carry with them other senior people within the organization.

Educational institutions should develop networks which should, amongst other things, promote faculty exchange, credit transfer, quality, inter-disciplinary studies, etc.

A network normally means that there has to be a two-way flow of work. Every member has to contribute according to its strengths and draw benefits to make up for its shortcomings. It is possible to have some members who are passive i.e. those who are beneficiaries but do not feed information to the network. This has to be a conscious decision based on policy.

It is important to create local knowledge-sharing networks to help innovators share their inventions with potential users and other innovators both to gain recognition for their work and to increase knowledge generation for further innovation. This calls for public support for local knowledge-sharing networks. iv. Dissemination The practice of creating a budget head and making a provision for dissemination should be adopted.

Strategies, such as training programs, lectures, discussions, media, internet, etc. need to be utilized for effective dissemination. Brainstorming sessions, seminars, conferences and workshops were organized for achieving the objective of creating awareness among various stakeholders. These sessions also helped in collecting inputs from them. Such interactions of varying duration need to be conducted on an ongoing basis in different parts of the country where industry and academia interact for sharing knowledge on knowing-doing. We have to develop a culture of sharing information. In organizations, systems for recognition and reward need to be established. Individual persons, especially those possessing traditional knowledge, have also to be incentivised for dissemination

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Orientation or awareness development programs will be useful to everyone while advanced programs may be organized for those who are directly engaged on knowledge issues.

While large industries can finance and organize training programs on their own, for MSME mechanisms shall have to be evolved to ensure outreach.

Internet is emerging as a powerful means of disseminating information widely, accurately, promptly and economically. As such, internet access should be made accessible to as many as possible. In small towns, print medium is still the most commonly used medium of mass communication. Therefore, libraries should be provided in small towns and they should be connected to the National Knowledge Network.

Dissemination is not merely a top down process. It is a bottom up process as well. In fact, it is a multi-directional process. We need institutional arrangements for this purpose. For such a complex country as India, there should be adequate research on dissemination. Amongst other things, impact of dissemination should be evaluated. It should also be assessed whether the required documentation is taking place and whether sufficient facilities exist for documentation.

In addition to lack of knowledge, attitudes also are a serious problem in work. Attitudes also can be influenced through appropriate dissemination. Concerned experts should look into this problem and develop suitable content of dissemination for development of right attitudes.

Just as experts go to potential users of technology in agriculture as a part of their composite functions of education, research and extension, technology should be disseminated for noncommercial purposes to the people. This step will promote human development. Funds should be provided for this purpose. Community Polytechnics are already doing this work. However, institutional arrangements need to be expanded a great deal.

Studies should be undertaken to identify best practices, success stories, innovation, etc. Findings of such studies should be disseminated widely.

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v. Inclusion We should include the excluded, e.g. the poor and marginalized to whom access is denied, if knowledge economy is to be realized.

Inclusive development of women in India calls for raising the capabilities of huge magnitudes of women through KM. In addition, if India can fully benefit from its demographic dividend and dominate globally in supplying skilled manpower to the rest of the ageing nations of the world – mostly developed countries, then annually about 50 million persons need to be trained.

Public policy on KM for inclusive development should facilitate greater and active participation of social partners on a mission mode through Public Private Partnership (PPP).

Trainable women among the target groups should be identified through a participatory process involving the prospective beneficiaries and their communities / villages.

KM for capacity development should be structured into three phases: Pre-vocational training, vocational training and post-training follow-up. Certifications of training should focus on quality assurance of the trained, and not merely certifying their attendance.

It would be best to involve industry in all stages of training from choice of vocational courses, designing course content and structure, imparting training, and certification of training.

Knowledge management is a continuous process and it improves skill development and productivity continuously. It should be used to fight poverty and improve the quality of employment. The strategies for inclusive development will have to build upon the resources in which poor people are especially rich: their knowledge, values, social networks, and institutions.

We have policies on e-Governance in place. Emphasis now has to be on effective execution of such knowledge management projects.

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At present, training provided by government agencies is largely supply driven. Strategies should be developed to identify skill deficiencies and align training to meet existing and emerging skill needs. Training should be benchmarked with best practices. There is a need for a national training strategy. It should be evolved.

vi. International Perspective India’s international co-authorship of scientific publications increased by a factor of more than three between 1985 and 2005 to 20.6 per cent. The share of patents with co-inventors in two or more countries nearly doubled from 4 per cent in the early 1990s to more than 7 per cent in early 2000s (OECD, 2008a). The share of India is still very small. Measures should be adopted to increase India’s share commensurate with its potential.

Recognition of professional expertise internationally is important to facilitate our experts to go to other countries for offering consultancy services. This requires the development of our own system for recognizing expertise as per international standards and getting the same accredited by the concerned international agencies.

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