International Collaboration


S. Natesh, E-mail: natesh.dbt@nic.in

Global Partnerships - Strategic leveraging

International cooperation and partnerships are necessary in order to be globally competitive in a knowledge-based economy. While the cost advantage of doing so has served the country well in the past, in the long run India's endeavor is to attain global quality standards. For India, it is essential to forge international alliances both with public- and private-sector partners, in developed as well as developing countries. This will help to achieve global best practices in S&T efforts for joint IPR generation, harmonization of regulatory processes, smooth trans-boundary movement of biological materials, and to leverage better global markets for biotech products and processes.

 It is easy to sign memoranda of understanding with other countries, sacrificing strategy in favor of numbers, often with little follow-up action once the MOU is signed. But partnerships work well only when each partner can gain something from the other. The Department of Biotechnology (DBT), the nodal department in the Government of India for international collaboration in biotechnology, is making earnest efforts to usher in enduring international collaborations with a few well-chosen strategic partners such as Australia, Canada, Finland, Norway, Switzerland and the USA. Canada illustrates this point rather well. The visit of an Indian delegation to Canada in May 2006 stirred up considerable interest such that a number of high-ranking experts from Canadian academia and industry have been visiting the country. Result: DBT has already signed two MOUs respectively with Agriculture & Agri-food Canada and the National Research Council, Canada in November. It is also negotiating separate MOUs with University of Saskatchewan, and Ag-WestBio. Canadian experts are already providing critical technical inputs to the planning of the proposed Agri-food cluster at Mohali, Punjab. The cluster includes the National Agri-food Biotech Institute (NABI) and a Bioprocessing Unit (BPU) to be established as autonomous institutions of DBT, along with an Agri-biotech park of start-up companies proposed to be set up through public-private partnership. It is hoped that Canadian companies would participate in the cluster through licensing agreements or joint ventures with Indian partners. Additionally, three joint workshops on biofuels, health biotechnology and food biotechnology have already been held in India during February-March '07 to fine tune R&D priorities for collaboration. Soon joint calls inviting proposals for funding will be issued.   Australia is another country with which a strong collaboration is being forged. Both countries have set up a matching fund of Au$ 6 million each over a three-year period for collaborative research. India has an ongoing R&D collaboration with Finland and Norway in mutually identified areas. DBT is currently discussing the feasibility of setting up an Indo-Finnish Centre for Diagnostics in India. Hopefully, these strategic partnerships will yield early dividends.