Dear Friend of the Oxford India Centre for Sustainable Development,
Welcome to the latest issue of the OICSD newsletter featuring updates on our research, scholarships and events.
We wrapped up another busy Hilary term at the University of Oxford. The highlight of this term is that we initiated some new collaborations within Oxford and beyond. We hosted an event with the Oxford Sustainable Finance Students’ Society and the International Institute of Forecasters’ UK Chapter. Our new batch of scholars made their first presentations for the OICSD Research Showcase this term. It involved presentations on a wide range of topics within the paradigm of sustainable development in India, including themes of access, exclusion, marginality and inequality. We have a new doctor from the OICSD who completed their DPhil this term. Our scholar-in-focus section will introduce you to one of our alumni continuing their work in India. This edition offers a summary of this term in Oxford. As we head for our Easter break, we are also planning to collaborate with diverse range of initiatives working on sustainable development challenges in India and the world in the upcoming Trinity term.
Please read on for more about the Centre’s latest updates on research, events and plans for the centre.
OICSD Research Highlights
Prof Radhika Khosla’s input as Specialist Advisor to the UK’s Environmental Audit Committee report on Heat Resilience and Sustainable Cooling. The work examines the relationship between heat and health; the adequacy of current Government policies in relation to current and future need for cooling; and considered measures to be taken to increase adaptation and resilience to rising temperatures. The full report is available here.
Dr Siddharth Arora co-authored two publications on the probabilistic forecasting. In the first paper, a machine learning approach to quantile regression foresting is used to produce probabilistic forecast of patient waiting times in an emergency department. The second paper uses similar methodology to study daily COVID-19 admissions for a local hospital trust.
Apoorva Kulkarni co-authored a paper for the Ornithological Applications – journal of the American Ornithological Society. The paper is titled, “Decolonizing bird knowledge: More-than-Western bird-human relations”. The paper combines ornithological methods with key terms, theories and methods in social sciences to advance the understanding of traditional ecological knowledge systems. Read it here.
Dr Shobhana Nagraj is the co-author of three publications on studying the role of medical professionals and students. The first two publications are on the service evaluation of medical support workers in the Oxford University Hospital’s NHS Foundation Trust. In another publication, Dr Nagraj is analysing the ethical impacts of international medical electives where local students from the UK visit low- and middle-income countries.
Dr Anant Jani’s co-authored paper conducts a literature review of negative impacts of growing automobile culture. The paper, titled “Car harm: A global review of automobility’s harm to people and the environment” is published in the Journal of Transport Geography and offers a summary of potential interventions that are ready for implementation.
Dr Vikranth Nagaraja and Dr Anant Jani’s article is published in the journal of Health Policy and Technology. The study assesses the use of telemedicine in India after the publication of Telemedicine Guidelines, 2020. Read the article here.
OICSD Events
The term started with a collaboration with the Oxford Sustainable Finance Students’ Society. OICSD Programme Director Dr Siddharth Arora delivered a talk on “Energy Solutions and Sustainable Finance: Trends, Opportunities and Challenges”. The talk received a resoundingly positive response from the attendees as Dr Arora simplified a complex topic. Read the detailed blog post here.
We hosted the Quarterly Forecasting Forum for the International Institute of Forecasters (UK Chapter) in February. The day-long symposium had presentations from experts across UK institutions focusing on themes such as renewable energy scheduling, energy efficiency, studying disease outbreaks and statistics. Dr Siddharth Arora serves as the Secretary for the IIF’s UK chapter.
OICSD Research Showcase – Hilary 2024
Our 2023 cohort delivered their first presentations for this term’s research showcase at the OICSD. The showcase is an opportunity for the OICSD community to share their ongoing research. Presentations focused on critical themes such as inequality, exclusion, environmental casteism, public policy and forest sustainability. D
Sustainability Series – Lubaina Rangwala (WRI India)
Our second session in the Sustainability Series was delivered by Lubaina Rangwala. Lubaina is the Head of Urban Development and Resilience at WRI India. Her talk, “Exploring opportunities for community resilience in Mumbai’s dense urban settlements” discussed the process to create the Mumbai Climate Action Plan. WRI India has been the knowledge partner with the Brihan-Mumbai Municipal Corporation and the state government to create this plan. Read the details of her talk here.
Announcements
Congratulations to our newest doctor – Dr Divya Choudhary!
Divya joined the OICSD in 2020 to read for a DPhil in Biochemistry on the Indira Gandhi Scholarship.
Her DPhil investigated the mechanisms by which bacteria respond to reactive oxygen species, which are toxic molecules produced by immune cells to combat infection and during antibiotic treatment. Through a combination of modelling, experiments using single-cell microfluidics, and machine learning techniques, she devised approaches to determine the ‘hidden variables’ contributing to the apparent randomness in bacterial responses against stresses. She is starting a joint postdoctoral fellowship between the Harvard Medical School and the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology at Harvard University.
Bhimraj Muthu and Swapnil Tripathi have been selected for the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights’ Graduate Research Residency Programme. Bhimraj is reading for an MPhil in Law on the Ratanshaw Bomanji Zaiwalla Scholarship and Swapnil is the Gopal Subramaniam scholar reading for a DPhil in Law. They will continue their research in the fields of human rights, public law and the rule of law through the residency.
Aanchal Saxena has been selected as an Impact Fellow at the Oxford SDG Impact Lab. This provides an opportunity for postgraduate students to deliver solutions to complex environmental and social challenges. She is pursuing Masters in Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government on the Elizabeth Moir Scholarship.
Professor Radhika Khosla presented at the India Cooling Coalition’s Annual Conclave in New Delhi on 20th March. The presentation was titled, “Climate Action Through Sustainable Cooling: Policy Perspectives” and it discussed policies promoting passive cooling, enhancing energy efficiency and how implementation of these measures can curb cooling demand.
Call for Papers – Education and Inequity: Perspectives from South Asia
We are collaborating with Education South Asia to host a symposium on 24th May 2023. The theme is “Education and Inequity: Perspectives from South Asia”. It aims to bring together graduate students, researchers and practitioners to explore these entanglements from a multidisciplinary perspective.
The deadline to submit proposals is on 5th April 2024, 23:59.
More details here.
Scholar in focus – Gabriella D’Cruz
Gabriella is a marine conservationist based in Panjim, Goa. She graduated with an MSc Biodiversity Conservation and Management on the Indira Gandhi Scholarship from OICSD in 2017-18. She has spent the last 5 years working exclusively on seaweed in India prior to which she worked on coral reef conservation projects and cetacean monitoring with the WWF India office.
She started The Good Ocean in 2021 which promotes native Indian seaweed for the Indian market. It is India’s first seaweed food company, wild harvesting native Indian seaweed from the coast of Goa, processing it and selling it to restaurants and other companies in the food & beverage sector. Their aim is to promote the benefits of seaweed as a low carbon, local seafood that is highly nutritious.
The Good Ocean is currently focused on scaling up production, training more harvesters and researching the potential for native seaweed farm models in Goa. Gabriella’s work has won her the BBC Global Youth Champion award 2021 and she was invited by the Rockefeller Foundation to be part of a roadmap exercise for encouraging seaweed as a Regenerative Aquatic Food.
Support the OICSD
The OICSD is supported by a network of philanthropists in India and the UK, who have enabled us to double the number of postgraduate scholarships we offer to talented Indian students. If you would like to support our mission of education and research that benefits India and the world, the Oxford India Foundation (Section 8 registered non-profit) gives donors based in India a new and tax-efficient way to support the activities of the OICSD.
For more information about making a gift to support the Centre, please contact our Director of Development Sara Kalim at: sara.kalim@some.ox.ac.uk.
