Thiruvananthapuram: The Kerala Government and UN's Office of Information and Communication Technology will join hands to set up the country's first UN Technology Innovation Lab here, it was announced on Wednesday.
The Kerala Startup Mission will be spearheading this initiative on behalf of Kerala government and water, sanitation, mobility and agriculture are areas the state government have identified as best suited for this innovation centre, as it would not only address the needs of the state but also can be a collaboration lever with other UN member states experiencing similar issues, said an offical.
The start-ups in the state will be working closely with the Innovation lab to build products addressing these issues.
To take this forward, an ideation workshop was jointly organised by Kerala Startup Mission and United Nations Technology Innovations Labs (UNTIL) here on Wednesday in which top officials of the state government and the UN took part.
The proposed centre would be a United Nations technology project led by the Office of Information and Communication Technology and staffed with members from both the technology and substantive programme areas of the UN.
"Water and sanitation is today one of the sState's biggest concerns and we are involved in as many initiatives to resolve this. This association with United Nations will bring to us right project interventions, global technology, expertise, network through which start-ups and companies in Kerala can work on a sustainable solution, meaningful development and deployment for these pressing concerns which may also become a solution for other countries or regions as well," said state IT Secretary Sivasankar.
Kerala Startup Mission CEO Saji Gopinath opined that this initiative is a great opportunity for the Startups in Kerala to involve in creating path-breaking technologies that can address and resolve real-life concerns of common people.