Indian Chemical News (ICN), an important online resource for news, views, analysis, trends, technology updates and interviews with prominent leaders in the chemical and petrochemical space, is organizing its next e-Conference focused on highlighting R&D initiatives of Indian chemical sector on November 06, 2020 from 15:00 PM till 16:30 PM IST.
The topic for the e-conference is "Role of R&D in Making Chemical Industry Aatma Nirbhar" and the session has an excellent mix of senior level speakers from India's top chemical industry fraternity inlcuding academia and leading global and local brands.
Senior stalwarts from industry speaking in the e-conference are: Madhu Vinjamur, Professor and Head, Department of Chemical Engineering, IIT Bombay; Prof. Aniruddha B Pandit, Vice Chancellor, Institute of Chemical Technology; Dr. Kommu Nagaiah, Chief Scientist & Head, CSIR- India Institute of Chemical Technology; Dr. R K Khandal, President – R&D, India Glycols Ltd; Subhra Mohanty, AVP – R&D, Reliance Industries Ltd; Dr. Mayukh G. Warawdekar, Sr. VP - R&D, Fine Organic industries; Vinod Paremal, Regional President, India, Evonik; Rahul Tikoo, Managing Director – South Asia, Huntsman Corporation and Dr. Manoj Surwade, Sales Development Manager, Chemical and Energy Market, Agilent.
Some of the key topics expected to be covered in the discussion includes:
• Reasons for low investment in R&D
• Creating awareness about the benefits of R&D
• Creation of R&D Fund
• Giving direct support to MSMEs for R&D
• Developing an institutional framework for R&D
• Enhancing Indian inventorship of patents
The Indian chemical industry is an industry-of-industries with a combined turnover of $160 billion growing at 100 basis points faster than India’s GDP, making it an important sector to propel the growth of the nation’s economy. Being one of the most diversified industries, the chemical industry in India covers more than 80,000 commercial products and is expected to double its size at $300 billion by 2025.
R&D is one of the important propellants’ of the industry’s growth. There are numbers of benefits of investing in R&D that are beyond innovation. The creation of innovative products not only adds new revenue streams but also increases brand visibility as well as opens up avenues for collaboration and PPP. The Government of India offers various tax incentives to encourage investments in R&D.
Still R&D in the chemical sector in India is not up to the mark. Continued R&D efforts in the part of the industry helps to improve the quality standards, obtain higher yields resulting in reduction in cost of production and to earn competitive edge in the International Market.
Speaking on the Role of R&D in Making Chemical Industry Aatma Nirbhar, Pravin Prashant, Editor, Indian Chemical News said, "The chemical industry stakeholders - Government, companies, academic institutions and startup community need to come together and work in a converged way so that everybody can reap the benefits of R&D."
The government should also deploy common R&D facilities in chemical clusters so that chemical companies can benefit from the shared resources, added Prashant.
R&D institutes within industry and R&D labs within college and universities will play a cohesive role by working together with chemical industry and solving their problems. All this will definitely make Indian chemical industry Aatma Nirbhar.
The government is swiftly implementing various schemes announced under the Rs. 20.97 lakh crore Aatma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyan package which is going to have a multiplier effect on the Indian economy.
ICN’s upcoming initiative on Aatma Nirbhar chemical sector aims to highlight success stories of self-reliant initiatives adopted by the industry towards making India a truly empowered nation.
The e-conference is being organized with support from Agilent Technologies.
