Pump Priming Projects
Short-term pilot projects designed to initiate further future collaboration; assess the needs of the community for other directed activities; develop new means of communicating joint research results; assess the state of knowledge and/or conduct proof-of-concept pilot studies. Five Pump Priming Projects were funded through the IUKWC.
The first two PPPs arose from the first IUKWC workshop and the last two arose from the first GFES event. The second PPP gave rise to the topic for the third workshop and brought the topic full circle with a funded project (HEPPI under WCSSP-India).
All projects comprised of at least one UK and one Indian collaborator as Activity Leads. The PPPs were initiated using a combination of Focused Calls and targeted pieces of work commissioned directly by the IUKWC on a specific topic, to ensure delivery across the Centre's scientific themes. The Centre provided funding and support in agreeing the scope of the work. Funding was limited to £10,000 for UK partners and ₹15,00,000 for Indian partners.
| Project Title | Duration | Activity Leads | Location | Publications |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The influence of the monsoon on freshwater availability for agriculture in the Sundarbans region of West Bengal, India, under current and climate change conditions | 2nd May to 31st August 2019 | Prof. Lalu Das and Dr. Alexandre Gagnon | Sundarbans, West Bengal, India | |
| Improving our understanding of the aquifer system in the Sundarbans | 1st May to 30th October 2019 | Dr. Gopal Krishan, Dr Purnabha Dasgupta, and Dr. Andrew McKenzie | Sundarbans, West Bengal, India | |
| Synergistic utilisation of EO-based soil moisture observations: Applications in the UK and India | 1st Dec 2017 to Mayst May 2018 | Dr. Manika Gupta and Dr. Emma Tebbs | University of Delhi, India | |
| Current opportunities and challenges in developing hydro-climatic services in the Himalayas | 2nd Feb to 31st August 2017 | Dr Martin Widmann and Dr. J. Sanjay | UK | |
| Ways of optimising new hydro-climatic services for stakeholders | 1st Feb to 31st October 2017 | Dr. Zareen Bharucha and Dr. Rajib Chattopadhyay | Maharashtra, India |