The development of the Ecodesign course for Industrial Design students and professionals in India

The Indian Institute of Technology at Delhi (IITD), in a collaboration project with Delft University of Technology (DUT), The Netherlands and with INETI, a Portuguese research institute, has initiated a project to create an Ecodesign Network in the Delhi region in India. The curricular part of the project is oriented to the development of Ecodesign courses for Industrial Design students and professionals in India. During the last 4 years several experiments have been done in the usage of different Ecodesign tools from Europe. These experiments have been conducted in the courses and projects done by the students of the Industrial Design Programme. Specific Ecodesign tools from different origins like the UNEP 'Promise manual' and the INETI checklist have been applied in studio exercise of product redesign and the exercise outcomes studied with the intention of locating the methods correctly in the design process. Issues of the larger context and role of design are also integrated into the programme that goes by the title of 'Design for Sustainable Development'. This course has been offered to students for three years now. The paper explains the theoretical background and the experiences in conducting the course.