Business Chinese (B) Rishabh Dev Rana Hazarika Rizurekh Saha Pranay Prateek Narendra Yadav Piyush Priyam Kartikeya K. Sharma Sudeep Banerjee Vishal Kumar GRASS ROOT INNOVATIONS How to ignite, sustain & promote them

S UPPORT TO G RASS R OOT I NNOVATORS Findings Identify Most of the grass root innovators never come to the forefront Evolve a mechanism to identify them Village panchayat or the smallest unit at village level can take up the task Promote After a set of them are identified, government needs to promote them A central team should match such need gap requirements to the innovators Help Evolve a mechanism, such as GIAN or SRSTHI, which helps grass root innovators Keep the help mechanism away from the red tape Evolve a fast and speedy mechanism to help, Collaborate Collaboration amongst the innovators and the people is most pivotal to help the innovations in spreading Most of the times these collaboration help in improvement of existing innovation Institutionalize Institutionalizing the innovations by incorporating laws and concessions for the innovators will help a long way in firmly establishing the strong foothold of grass root innovations Honey Bee Network A crucible of like-minded individuals, innovators, farmers, scholars, academicians, policy makers, entrepreneurs and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) Presence in more than seventy five countries Over the last twenty years has documented more than 1,00,000 ideas, innovations and traditional knowledge practices A crucible of like-minded individuals, innovators, farmers, scholars, academicians, policy makers, entrepreneurs and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) Presence in more than seventy five countries Over the last twenty years has documented more than 1,00,000 ideas, innovations and traditional knowledge practices GIAN Network GIAN is an incubator of grassroots innovations and traditional knowledge GIANs have been setup at Ahmedabad & Jaipur for providing incubation support to grassroots innovators GIAN is helping unaided, unqualified, untrained individual innovator from the informal sector who has conceptualized/developed technological innovation and/or outstanding traditional knowledge practices. GIAN is an incubator of grassroots innovations and traditional knowledge GIANs have been setup at Ahmedabad & Jaipur for providing incubation support to grassroots innovators GIAN is helping unaided, unqualified, untrained individual innovator from the informal sector who has conceptualized/developed technological innovation and/or outstanding traditional knowledge practices.

C ORPORATE H OUSES I NVOLVEMENT Reduce demand 1 3 Off-shoring and outsourcing Lean optimization 4 5 Enable IT 6 Optimize organizational structure and governance Consolidate and centralize support services 2 7 Develop capabilities and mindsets Reduce demand 1 Consolidate and centralize support services 2 3 Off-shoring and outsourcing Lean optimization 4 5 Enable IT 6 Optimize organizational structure and governance ▪ The first and foremost role of the corporate houses can be the help with initial funding ▪ A seperate incubation center can be formed within corporate houses for promotion of the same Funding 1 Second most important help of the corporate houses can be in promoting the innovators via their networks Promotion will create awareness and build public opinion in support of the innovations Promoting 2 ▪ Such innovations can be used as pool for new products and services, in which the grass root innovation can be taken up at commercial level profitably ▪ This will ensure easier and faster proliferation of the innovations 3 Value proposition for them ▪ Mitticool, a clay refrigerator that works without electricity, has attracted companies in the US and Spain. The green innovator, Mansukh Prajapati, has already sold several units of the refrigerator to companies in these countries. ▪ The Honey Bee Network (HBN) and National Innovation Foundation (NIF), which scout and document innovations from remote areas in the country, have received enquiry from 40 countries for 27 products. Some Examples from the past 4 5 Future Course  The future success of grass root innovations lies in dual support of government as well as corporate houses  While government has to provide policy and principle support, corporate houses should bear the finances  This will result in 3 fold benefit for government, people as well as the corporate houses ▪ India as well as china share a great amount of intellectual similarity ▪ If the grass root innovations are properly captured, popularized and commercialized, it will contribute a lot to achieving millennium development goals ▪ Finally, once institutional and support structure stabilize in our respective countries, we can think of a greater inter nation collaboration. 6 Conclusion

A CASE STUDY EXAMPLE Market Potential 68% of rural Indian women can’t afford sanitary napkins 81% of rural women use cloth Corporate funding & help Support such innovations with seed fund Provide guidance and coaching in product development phase Help to market the product effectively Solution Muruganatham has developed a low cost, portable machine that produces sanitary napkins at Rs. 1 to Rs per pad