Realising the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will require transformative changes at micro, meso and macro levels and across diverse geographies. Collaborative, transdisciplinary research has a role to play in documenting, understanding and contributing to such transformations. Previous work has investigated the role of this research in Europe and North America, however the dynamics of transdisciplinary research on ‘transformations to sustainability’ in other parts of the world are less well-understood. This paper reports on an international project that involved transdisciplinary research in six different hubs across the globe and was strategically designed to enable mutual learning and exchange. It draws on surveys, reports and research outputs to analyse the processes of transdisciplinary collaboration for sustainability that took place between 2015–2019. The paper illustrates how the project was structured in order to enable learning across disciplines, cultures and contexts and describes how it also provided for the negotiation of epistemological frameworks and different normative commitments between members across the network. To this end, it discusses lessons regarding the use of theoretical and methodological anchors, multi-loop learning and evaluating emergent change (including the difficulties encountered). It offers insights for the design and implementation of future international transdisciplinary collaborations that address locally-specific sustainability challenges within the universal framework of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
The COVID-19 related lockdowns have brought the planet to a standstill. It has severely shrunk the global economy in the year 2020, including India. The blue economy and especially the small-scale fisheries sector in India have dwindled due to disruptions in the fish catch, market, and supply chain. This research presents the applicability of satellite data to monitor the impact of COVID-19 related lockdown on the Indian fisheries sector. Three harbors namely Mangrol, Veraval, and Vankbara situated on the north-western coast of India were selected in this study based on characteristics like harbor’s age, administrative control, and availability of cloud-free satellite images. To analyze the impact of COVID in the fisheries sector, we utilized high-resolution PlanetScope data for monitoring and comparison of “area under fishing boats” during the pre-lockdown, lockdown, and post-lockdown phases. A support vector machine (SVM) classification algorithm was used to identify the area under the boats. The classification results were complemented with socio-economic data and ground-level information for understanding the impact of the pandemic on the three sites. During the peak of the lockdown, it was found that the “area under fishing boats” near the docks and those parked on the land area increased by 483%, 189%, and 826% at Mangrol, Veraval, and Vanakbara harbor, respectively. After phase-I of lockdown, the number of parked vessels decreased, yet those already moved out to the land area were not returned until the south-west monsoon was over. A quarter of the annual production is estimated to be lost at the three harbors due to lockdown. Our last observation (September 2020) result shows that regular fishing activity has already been re-established in all three locations. PlanetScope data with daily revisit time has a higher potential to be used in the future and can help policymakers in making informed decisions vis-à-vis the fishing industry during an emergency situation like COVID-19.
The Indian Biopharmaceutical landscape interests scholars from innovation studies, economic geography and policy learning to understand various regional dimensions that fuel knowledge production in relation to emerging technologies. Globalization has a strong influence on such high technology clusters, wherein 'local' play a significant role. With this prelude, the study attempts to understand the nature and typology of Global Innovation Networks (GINs), by assessing the degree of globalness, innovativeness and networkedness of firms, located in India's first organized Biosciences R&D cluster, Genome Valley, Hyderabad (India). On reflecting over the typologies of GINs and their degrees of globalness, innovativeness and networked ness in Biopharmaceutical firms, the paper contends that firms have an export-oriented objective and are competing with their global competitors; innovation seems to be mostly incremental in nature; the sector is battling due to absence of linkages with funding agencies and basic research institutions. However, the entire cluster with pre-existing capabilities, vantage points and resources, coupled with GINs, is evolving as a potent site for innovation. Also, this paper opens up the scope for future research, by aligning socio-economic aspects of networks and linkages, in terms of the health outcomes or social relevance derived out of the networks and linkages across the globe.
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