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With rising prosperity and urbanisation in emerging and developing economies there has been a rapid expansion of waste generation. India, with an urban population of 377 million that is expected to reach 590 million by 2030, is also facing an unprecedented challenge of waste management. Significant uncertainties about the future trajectories of waste management exist, including the concept of waste as a resource and the role of the informal sector. This article describes an analytical framework that combines foresight and political economy methods used in a multi-stakeholder workshop setting to develop future scenarios for the sector. The process provides insights to increase participation in waste management policymaking in India by opening up the process beyond expert committees. The use of foresight tools with political economy analysis has the potential to democratise the policymaking process of waste management in India for the inclusion of all stakeholders and particularly the informal sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This commentary discusses the Science, Technology and Innovation Policy 2013 of India in relation to the bottom-up 'informal science'. The main intention is to see how informal innovations or informal ways of knowledge generation in the informal sector are dealt with in the new policy document. Informal economy or informal sector, which constitutes a staggering 94% of India's workforce, forms the main source of employment and livelihood. However, neither the current Science, Technology and Innovation Policy document nor any other innovation literature proposes a comprehensive policy framework that leverages the strengths of informal sector innovations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]