In our current climate of COVID pandemic and lockdowns, we are all looking for some positive good news story to sustain hope, optimism for our future. Against that backdrop comes a great story of hope and optimism but a story which guarantees not only a solid foundation, but also a world class research collaboration and cooperation platform to bring together the best of minds from Australia and India.
It is the story of ARCH-India – the Australian Researcher Cooperation Hub India which will support researcher engagement between India and Australia to strengthen and increase bilateral research collaboration and showcase the research excellence of both countries.
An initiative of the Australian Government Department of Education, Skills and Employment (DESE) and the Australia India Institute (AII) – ARCH-India will serve up a platform for researchers to connect expertise, build relationships, share information, and explore opportunities for collaboration and mobility.
The ARCH-India platform will bring together a network of institutions, government organisations, industry and corporations to build pathways for greater research collaboration between Australia and India.
Research collaboration is a pathway to commercialisation and technological advancement.
India is already the world’s fastest growing large economy and the third largest contributor to global growth. Over the next twenty years it will need many of the goods and services which Australia is well positioned to supply.
“But over that time India will also become a much more crowded and competitive marketplace. Australia must prepare for that through a strategic investment in the relationship and a long term and ambitious strategy led at the highest levels of government”, wrote Peter N. Varghese AO Chancellor of the University of Queensland in submitting his report: An India Economic Strategy to 2035. Navigating from potential to delivery to the then Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.
“There is no market over the next twenty years which offers more growth opportunities for Australian business than India. Getting our India strategy right will both enhance the prosperity and security of Australians and help realise the aspirations of the 1.3 billion Indians who sense their time has come and a better life is within their grasp”, Mr. Varghese added.
Noting that the collaborative research between Australian and Indian researchers had increased significantly in the last two decades, and was up 40 per cent since 2015, there was considerable scope for further improvement, the 2018 report said.
By 2035, Australia hopes to raise its exports to India to $45 billion ($14.9 billion in 2017) and Australian investment in India to $100 billion ($10.3 billion). Peter Varghese said it would be “a transformational expansion of the relationship. That is the size of the opportunity and the key lesson for Australia of India’s scale, the momentum which is already built into its growth trajectory and the underlying complementarity between our two economies.”
Axiomatically, in all this, ARCH-India is the best strategic fit.
ARCH-India will not only ensure top talent from both countries coming together, it will also put Australia in a guaranteed advantageous position over many of its competitors. Research partners of today will become ambassadors and business partners of tomorrow.
Remember Facebook, Google and YouTube (list can be too long) were only ideas once.
Thus ARCH-India offers a win-win platform for researchers and entrepreneurs from India and Australia.
“I hope for ARCH-India that over the coming years it becomes an established forum and an established platform. A forum for dialogue is really important in international relations right now – in connecting countries and people and institutions”, said Professor Abid Khan, Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Vice-President (Global Engagement), Monash University, Melbourne.
Also read: Andrew Robb AO, Amit Dasgupta appointed Distinguished Fellows at Australia India Institute
What’s on offer:
Research areas, connections and resources
The platform offers a research landscape of 15 key research areas of bilateral importance, including education, health, infrastructure and many more. It has a large collection of research organisations in both countries with focus in those key areas of research. Apart from research organisations, the portal offers access to a comprehensive overview of not-for profit, universities, industry and their areas of expertise.
The portal allows access to other resources promoting collaboration between both countries’ researchers, including news and events, researcher profile databases, scholarly articles and travel resources.
Colleagues and mentors
Through the ARCH-India portal you will be able to get connected with both countries’ researchers in your field or seek guidance from academic and industry mentors to support your collaboration endeavours.
Funding opportunities
You will also find funding information on institutions and programs that can help further your research through funding, offering program support, and other resources.
If you are or know someone who is an academic in India or Australia, interested in research or have an ‘idea’, you cannot afford to miss the opportunity to join ARCH-India.
“I see ARCH-India as an enabler for sustainable, scalable research and also engagement between two countries, building from a very strong research base” said Ravneet Pawha, Deputy Vice President (Global Engagement) and CEO (South Asia), Deakin University, Delhi.
How to get involved?
You simply register and upload your researcher profile. To register, click here.
Access will be available after the launch on the 31st of August.
That will allow you to:
- Showcase research news you have written or shared
- Highlight case studies you have worked on
- Flexibly indicate research you are open to collaborating on
- Add yourself to a searchable pool of Indo-Pacific research expertise open to industry, NGO and governments
ARCH-India will be launched on Tuesday, August 31 at 3.30pm AEST (11.00am IST).
All are invited to join the launch event for free. To register click here.
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