Thiruvananthapuram, Jan 28 (UNI) Kerala Government is planning to come out with a State Design Policy that will promote innovations and competitiveness through focused interventions to build a design-integrated ecosystem and mark the state as a major design hub, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has said.
“The Design Policy should involve strategies to promote innovations and competitiveness and guide through a design-integrated ecosystem that aims at tapping the domestic and global market capitalisation,” Vijayan said on Thursday while inaugurating a three-day Design Policy workshop, jointly organised by the departments of Tourism and Public Works.
“Design by Future” is the theme of the workshop that began on Thursday at Craft Village at Vellar,near Kovalam. It will evolve a draft design policy that factors in Kerala’s traditional design concepts while imbibing new trends and foreseeing the future needs, while creating and preserving public assets including the tourism-related infrastructure.
The policy will lay down good practices to be followed while designing physical assets such as roads, bridges, streets, street furniture, signages and public spaces, which are crucial in enhancing experience of tourists.
Vijayan said the new Design Policy should build capabilities, support technical development, enable financial interventions and bridge the gap between creativity and innovation.
“The focus should be on promoting the adoption of design in businesses as well as in the public sector.The policy should be less of a regulatory framework and more of a capacity building one. It should enable the growth of the design sector by facilitating designers and design firms,” the Chief Minister said.
Noting that theDesign Policy should provide a framework to stakeholders and decision makers, Vijayan said critically approaching the design of a project right at the planning stage itself is imperative to ensure that time and resources are not wasted.
The Chief Minister lauded the Tourism and Public Works departments for bringing together all stakeholders from the design sector to the workshop to draft a policy that is going to bring about a paradigm shift. He also released the Kerala State Design Policy Workshop 2023 logo at the function.
Presiding over the function, Tourism and Public Works Minister PA Mohamed Riyas said the “the draft policy evolving from the workshop will be the country’s first going by its aims and objectives. This policy will radically change how we imagine, design and construct our public utility buildings in PWD and Tourism, when Kerala is set to emerge as a global tourist destination.”
In his keynote address, Chief Secretary, Government of Kerala, VP Joy, said the workshop is a pathbreaking initiative as the state is aspiring to become a global design destination and the government is focusing on more design-oriented activities.
Principal Secretary Tourism, KS Srinivas highlighted the importance of improving the infrastructure in the state considering the competition it faces from other countries in tourism sector. Tourism Director P B Nooh said the policy will be inclusive and assimilative in nature and enable to enhance quality of life.
Former Dean of School of Planning & Architecture, New Delhi, Prof K T Raveendran, will present the draft design policy when the workshop concludes on Saturday.
The workshop is being attended by around 200 delegates, including officials and representatives of Kerala Tourism and PWD.
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