Surveying the journey that Kerala has traversed so far and the State’s development trajectory, Tie Kerala held an in-depth discussion on the vision for Kerala on where the State should be headed. 

Opening the discussions, Aruna Sundararajan, Former Secretary, Ministry of Steel, IT and Telecom Division said the three areas where Kerala must focus on are - Female participation in labour force, Need of Eco-friendly innovation and building creative economy.

Women participation

Kerala’s woment participation is about 25 per cent whereas Himachal Pradesh, which is a small state, has 50 per cent. The conundrum needs to be addressed, she said.

“We need eco-friendly innovation for sustainable solutions to our problems. There is a huge opportunity for Kerala as a whole to leverage ESG (the environmental, social and governance) brand. Kerala should establish itself by giving everything we manufacture and our services the ESG tag, which will have a huge cache going forward”, she added.

Kerala is the great State for the rise of innovators and entrepreneurs in a creative economy. The explosion of social media and the extraordinary talent pool that Kerala has in diverse fields like content creation, film making, arts, visual arts need to be tapped by taking specific sets of measures that can establish the State as the hub of creative economy in India, Aruna Sundararajan said.

Genomic technologies

The advancements in material sciences and digital technologies are coming together. In innovations and start-ups Kerala is not second to any. There is also reverse migration happening. Kerala is going to benefit from these, she added.

Thomas Isaac, Former Finance Minister accentuated three focus areas to keep the State in growth path - Focusing on Gender justice, improving women participation mainly by providing more employment opportunities for educated women Secondly, driving cultural promotions by way of art, theatre, books, music and events. Thirdly, social security measures for the aging population.

Sam Santhosh, Founder, SciGenom Research Foundation said a number of Keralites have entered the emerging field of genomics with the definite understating that the current century is providing an answer through biology.

‘This is the century of the bio-wave. With the aid of genomic technologies. high yield better crops that withstand drought and salt water can be cultivated. Bio manufacturing and genomics-based discovery of plant genes for synthetic biology will take us to a new world like sandalwood oil without cutting sandalwood and thereby preserving nature and environment,’ he said.

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