‘Facilitating a Green Renaissance by Actively Involving Key Stakeholders and Young Professionals’

In wake up of the looming climate change crisis and the dangers of global warming, recognizing the urgency for affirmative action, Technovanza has adopted the green mission and incorporated ‘Sustainability’ as a central theme for the festival. In alliance with their strategic knowledge partner, ‘SEE Sustainability’, Technovanza will host this 3-day National Symposium organizing a variety of programs covering topical issues within the spectrum of Sustainability. Christened as ‘Nivritti’, the primary purpose of the initiative is to serve as a multi-disciplinary youth awareness and education program and to facilitate positive change in India by engaging young minds with all the stakeholders of the society for shaping the future of a sustainable India’.

Today, as businesses and organizations across the world face one of the biggest challenges – that of not only combating climate change but also effectively serving the other 2 factors in the triple bottom line – i.e. social and economic – we must make complete efforts to bring about constructive awareness and thinking about the same amongst the future decision makers of the industry. Ensuring that the concept of sustainability – or rather survivability or even thrivability becomes the soul of all innovation and decision making – is the goal of the program. This is not just a time to reconsider the long‐term sustainability of various business models – but also capitalize on the huge opportunities that this challenge stands to offer.

SEE Sustainability is an organization working towards ensuring and expediting the process of sustainable development in emerging & developing economies by providing innovative, holistic and logical solutions to the problems faced by the 21st century world. Fuelled by passion towards social entrepreneurship and affection for the environment, SEE Sustainability aims to facilitate the process of inclusive growth by striving for commensurate integration between the social, environmental and economic aspects of human development.

With a core belief that ‘Social capital yields economic capital’ we are continually working towards creating an effective system of alliances between the public, private, academic, governmental and non-governmental institutions that can be leveraged for sustainable and equitable value creation. Partnering for the Nivritti symposium is one such initiative.

The 3-day symposium aims at constructive action as its outcome rather than mere passive conversation. It intends to achieve the same through the following events spread out over a period of three days.

• Formalized inauguration & closing addresses
•   Panel discussion I: “ Discussing Alternative Energy futures for the nation”

This will be a formal panel discussion that would have eminent experts from the energy sector as panelists. The panel would discuss various aspects of ‘ Mitigation options for India’. The theme has been derived from the National Action Plan for Climate Change, the recently drafted Copenhagen Accord, and a report by TERI which recommends the ‘Resolution’ alternate energy development scenario for the country. Experts from research/academic, government/public administrative and corporate backgrounds will throw light on the way forward for achieving energy sufficiency through renewable means.

• Panel discussion II: ‘Greenovation Arms – Towards Green campuses’

The aim of this panel discussion is 3 pronged. The session will be moderated by eminent experts in the respective fields

Best Practices Guidelines to make our campuses Eco-friendly: The aim of this discussion is to formulate general guidelines that can be followed to make our campuses eco friendly. The fellows will hold forth on various practices implemented by green campuses around the world, available models of green buildings, green information and communication technology, energy efficiency and renewable energy.  

Setting up Greenovation Arms: Through this initiative students are actively involved in their knowledge building via seminars and workshops, industrial visits, live projects and also think tank sessions. A framework / best practices for the same will also be discussed.

• Panel discussion III: “Facilitating an Urban Renaissance by Actively Involving Education Institutions in Sustainable City-making”

Facilitating an Urban Sustainability Renaissance: Discussions on how partnerships between Government bodies, Private sector, NGOs and students can help in facilitating an urban renaissance by actively involving educational institutions in proactive citymaking. Basically, this framework aims at establishing partnerships of the educational institutions with the local governments for sustainable (environment, social and economic) research projects.

• Special showcase sessions on corporate go-green initiatives

Today, various companies, small start-ups as well as corporate mammoths, are taking various initiatives towards going Green. Under this section, companies will brief on their Green initiatives which have brought about substantial change. They will give brief presentations and discuss as to how they have implemented Green technology/processes effectively.

• Work Action Groups (WAG)

Fellows will be divided into 3 WAG’s, each working towards a specific outcome as listed below  

WAG-1: The panel discussion I (Discussing alternative energy futures) will further continue into an open discussion involving the fellows. The fellows will ponder, analyze and dissect opinions expressed by experts during the panel discussion. They will then come out with a ‘recommendatory document’ which includes constructive suggestions that can be implemented for furthering an alternative energy future in the country.

WAG-2: The knowledge gained in the panel discussion II will be leveraged by the fellows to come up with a ‘Best Practices Document’ that can be forwarded to colleges/universities across the country for turning campuses green and facilitating a sustainable urban renaissance

WAG-3: The knowledge gained in the panel discussion III will be leveraged by the fellows to come up with a ‘recommendatory document’ that can be used as a policy tool to further explore partnerships between governments, private firms and institutes to include institutes in sustainable city making.