Centre for Sustainability

On 1st January 2016, the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s) of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development – adopted by world leaders in September 2015 at an historic UN Summit – officially came into force. Over the next fifteen years, with these new goals that universally apply to all, countries will mobilize efforts to end all forms of poverty, fight inequalities and tackle climate change, while ensuring that no one member is left behind.

It is clear that the 17 UN SDG’s not only help identify and determine where we have to be in 2030, but create a sustainable world, as also, outline the contours of new markets and opportunities all over the world.

Setup in this context, the ‘Centre for Sustainability’ (CfS) , at a core level, is an inter- disciplinary research Centre. The purpose is to bring together a community of businesses, corporations, faculty, students, researchers and practitioners from geographies far and near that are committed to the cause of ‘sustainability’; work on the common agenda; advance them and accelerate the global sustainability movement. The CfS as a ‘Centre of Excellence’ provides a robust platform to carry out research in any of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s) in an ‘open research format’, under which all participants are encouraged to ideate, connect and collaborate with fellow students, businesses, corporations, faculty, practitioners and researchers across the globe. At another level, they could also solicit the support & cooperation of the various constituents in each of the research processes viz formulation of the research theme, problem definition, objectives, design, literature survey, data collection, research tools, data analysis, interpretation and writing the report.

Interestingly, the CfS can also be utilized as a ‘Practice Centre’ as well as an ‘Action Centre’.

As a ‘Practice Centre’, researchers can reach out to the stakeholders from the perspective of ‘Practice’ to further understand, define and refine the research problem and its methodology. Further, a lot of research and developmental work has already been undertaken in the Himalayan region in the under-mentioned areas:

• Deforestation
• Air, Water, Land & Noise pollution
• Waste disposal
• Wildlife
• Illegal mining
• Water scarcity

Therefore, such of the academicians, researchers and practitioners who desire to build upon the existing scaffolding and/or connect the research and/or its findings with academia more specifically, use the research framework and/or its findings and outcomes to develop academic courseware and case studies for the Master’s or doctoral programs, will find the research platform extremely fascinating & rewarding.

As an ‘Action platform’, the CfS will aim to provide collaborative space for leading businesses to work with other significant stakeholders to learn and share effective ways to contribute to SDG implementation.