India and Italy to Strengthen Collaboration in Design

India and Italy to Strengthen Collaboration in Design
Union Minister of Commerce and Industry, Kamal Nath, today said that closer cooperation between India and Italy in the area of design education would be extremely advantageous in view of the urgent need to close the gap of requirement of designers which is 5000 per annum at different levels in diverse sectors in India including the emergent services sector, against an availability of less than 500 per annum.

Speaking at the Indo-Italian Design Education Road Show, organised by the European Institute of Design of Italy and the National Institute of Design (NID), Ahmedabad, here, Kamal Nath recalled that he had announced the government's decision to come out with a comprehensive National Design Policy and informed that in order to gather inputs from the industry and designers, interactive sessions had already taken place in Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore.

"The Policy will reflect the designer's role in economy and commerce and quality of life, design as a profession, design promotion and most importantly an action plan for spread of quality design education. We look to the Italian experience for inspiration in fine-tuning our Policy draft", he said. It was at his meeting with the Italian Minister Antonio Marzano last month that Shri Kamal Nath had mooted the idea of India and Italy collaborating actively to promote design.