Pesticides may have helped in controlling crop damage and increasing yield, but their usage has become so widespread in India as to pose significant health risks to its population. After extensive application, pesticides like DDT and Aldrin have been banned to check further damage to health and environment. However, most of these chemicals have a considerably long lifetime, and are present in the environment for hundreds of years.

A team of researchers in IIT-Madras has developed a technology called nanoparticles that can effectively treat and eliminate one of the most obstinate chemicals in pesticides called organochlorine, present in the unpopular pesticides like DDT, endoulfan, dioxin and aldrin. Seema Singh reports about this successful experiment in Mint:

“Even though some of these pesticides have been banned, they are very much present in the environment. For instance, endosulfan has an environmental lifetime of 100 years,” says T. Pradeep, professor of chemistry at IIT Madras. His nanoparticles, mostly from gold, silver, copper and several oxides, are effective on endosulfan even at very low concentration. “Efficient chemistry at low concentration is important so that even if one molecule of the pesticide passes by, it gets removed by the nanoparticle,” adds Pradeep.

The next challenge for the research team is to formulate ways to make the technology percolate to the people who need it most, in rural areas. The costs need to be brought down to a large extent to make it accessible to the country’s poor.

Eureka is interested in taking this technology to rural population but the high cost of manufacturing could hinder the outreach for some time. “We intend to take this up as a no-loss, no-profit venture but that will have to wait until production goes up (and cost comes down),” says Abhay Kumar, general manager of water technologies division at Eureka in Bangalore. A community water purifier prototype, using nanotechnology filter, is under construction. It is scheduled to be installed in Kasargod district, one of the endosulfan-affected areas in Kerala, by March.

“This effort has to multiply, through all possible channels – industry, non-governmental organization and most importantly, government machinery,” says Pradeep, whose interaction with the Central water resources ministry turned out to be a one-way affair. Under the US Clean Water Act of 1972, the extent of contaminants in a glass of water is decreasing, but the number of contaminants entering potable water is increasing, says Pradeep.

It is sad to know that India ranks among the lowest in drinking water quality standards set by the UN (120 out of the 122 nations judged). However, these rankings should be taken as an eye-opener that imminent action is necessary. And we are glad to hear this piece of good news from one of the premier educational institutes of the country. We wish them luck in successfully taking their findings to the masses so that many can benefit from the advances in technology.

Read the complate article here.
Image Courtesy: RSC.org

Gurgaon-based mobile gaming company ZMQ Software Systems has come up with a new offering that will enable women in villages to register their date of pregnancy, and avail of weekly tips on topics like what to eat, what vaccines to get and when to get the next check up. Founders Hilmi and Subhi Quraishi, inspired by many of their formative years spent in socialistic environment of Soviet Union, have been redirecting 12% of ZMQ’s profits into social development programmes, and this is a project they are certain will succeed as it is mobile-based and independent of economic criteria.

Aruna Viswanatha reports in Mint:

ZMQ’s new programme also complements other initiatives around the country to pay women to have their children delivered by professionals, rather than by the untrained midwives more popular in rural areas. “There could be a programmed SMS before the day of the next check-up,” says Chauhan, “and reminders for the first tetanus, the first ultrasound, this would be a real great benefit if it is done.”

Also find what other companies like Enable-M and the venture capital firm Acumen Fund are doing in this space. Biju Mohandas, India business manager for Acumen Fund says he is considering many business plans that intend to use SMS technology in rural health care. Read the complete article here.

As per some unconfirmed reports, there are more than 25 lakh Small and Medium scale Enterprises in India. These enterprises offer a diverse range of services and products. However, one of the main issues facing these industries is the lack of exposure to international level best practices. Practices that could help them achieve better efficiency and scale. For such enterprises, now there is some good news. The Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Calcutta and the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Madras along with Shobishiba, a Japanese management consultant have come together to devise a training program for these Indian SMEs. According to this article in The Mint, the program will help the enterprises in identifying the gaps in their practices in comparison to those in the developed nations and will train them in how they could bridge these gaps and attain better standards.
Excerpt:

The programme would start with 15 firms initially and the volume of participation would grow later depending on the success of the maiden run.

“Our aim is to help Indian SMEs understand why they trail the best SMEs in the world, and what they could do to achieve the same standards,” said Ramesh Datla, chairman, CII MSME (micro, small and medium enterprises) Council.

We at The Better India believe that such a training program was long due. It will help us not only to scale greater heights, but will also ensure that the entrepreneurial spirit of these workers will now get a better and organized channel to harness their own talent.

Read the complete article here.

Now, this comes as a sort of celebration for us at The Better India. Pallavi Singh writes in this article at the Mint about a policy being formulated to encourage children at school to use community radio and er, well, blog!

This is cool, we think, since it is introducing helpful technology to children in their early years. Excerpts from the article:

Blogging, the recommendations say, should be encouraged to support creative writing. “Blogs are powerful tools to support creative writing that can be published and shared not only with the teacher but also with peers and the world, alike. Spreadsheets, databases, concept maps, and hypermedia authoring tools (Web development tools) to encourage critical thinking could also be encouraged,’’ the draft compendium says.

It also suggests use of digital devices like robotics kits, digital microscopes, graphing calculators and global positioning system devices for science, math and social sciences curricula. To improve rural access, the draft recommendations also press for creation of localized content to be accessed on the web to help children “proactively explore and capture local realities’’.

However, some people have raised some misgivings about this policy too. Nothing is just one-sided now, is it.

Read the complete article to know more about the pros and cons of this policy.

Credit: Link provided by Vikas.

It is education once again appearing on The Better India.

Samanth Subramanian writes in this article at The Mint about the “Teach for India” campaign:

Around this time next year, 100 fresh college graduates will find themselves back in the classroom—but this time they’ll be standing in the front, teaching.

They may not want to be teachers, they may have no teaching degrees, and they may never teach again. But, for two years they’ll work in primary schools as part of the inaugural batch of the Teach For India, or TFI, campaign.

The initiative is funded wholly by the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation.

Read the complete article here.
Also See: All posts related to Education

Finally, we are beginning to see some convergence of two ends of the spectrum. The technology behind computer animation is now being introduced to help bring out the native artistic skills of tribals from various regions of the country.

Shruti Chakraborty writes in this article in the Mint, titled “Technology helping bring tribal art to life”.

Excerpt:

Gond tribal artist Gariba Tekam had never even seen a computer till two weeks back. Now, he’s working with technology to bring his images to life.

As he paints a blue fox on a piece of paper, part of the storyboard for an animation film on a squirrel’s dream, Tekam says he is excited to help one of the many folk stories from his Patangarh village in Madhya Pradesh reach a wider audience.

The artist’s quantum leap into computer technology comes after two days of not-so-intensive training, part of the two-week animation workshop conducted by the Adivasi Arts Trust, or AAT, at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, or IGNCA.

As of now, the program has on board tribals from three regions of India – the Gonds from Madhya Pradesh, Santhals from Jharkhand and West Bengal, and Meiteis and Thadou Kukis from Manipur.

To know more about how the project is being implemented and the genesis of this wonderful idea, please read the complete article here.