French Institute of Pondicherry
The French Institute of Pondicherry () UMIFRE 21 is a French research centre in Puducherry, India, under the joint supervision of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS). It is the largest of the 26 research centres under this dual umbrella. It is also part of the research unit 3330 "Savoirs et Mondes Indiens" of the CNRS, along with the Centre de Sciences Humaines (CSH) in New Delhi. History
Established under the terms of the  Treaty of Cession of French Territories in India, the French Institute of Pondicherry was inaugurated on 21 March, 1955 under the name "Institut Français d'Indologie".) It was engaged, under the leadership of its first director (Jean Filliozat), in the study of Indian civilization and culture, and more particularly in the history and the religions of South India. This culture had to be replaced in its natural environment – at least that was what Nehru encouraged the IFP to implement. Hence a department of Ecology was created to collect information on the conditions and evolution of the environment in South India (vegetation, soils, climate changes, etc.) with its focus on the Western Ghats, one of the world's 34 hotspots for biodiversity. With the setting up of the department of Social Sciences in 1988, the institute extended its interest to the evolution and dynamics of the Indian society. The Laboratory of Applied Informatics and Geomatics (LAIG) was set up in the 1990s. In 2017 it became the department GeoSMIT (GeoSpatial Monitoring and Information Technology). The institute has a library with 70,000 books and more than 120 journals currently received. It is open to the public (catalogue on line). Fields of research
 The IFP is composed of four departments. Yet two keywords group the main part of their research objects: "heritage" and "environment". Heritage, because of the many collections, quite unique (8,400 UNESCO-registered manuscripts, 15,500 species of pollen, 24,000 pages of herbarium, 130,000 photographs catalogued in the photo library ...). But also because of the publications of the IFP (critical editions of Sanskrit texts), and especially its research, dealing with religious rites as well as sacred groves or urban heritage policies. Environment, because this term encompasses very close issues addressed by the IFP, in terms of health and nutrition, Ayurvedic and siddha medicine, forest ecology, biodiversity conservation, climate change, or management of irrigation water. Research departments
 The Department of Indology (historical department) focuses its attention on classical India, namely its religions, its literature, its languages (contemporary Tamil, Sanskrit, etc.) to better interpret and study the foundations of modern India. The Department of Social Sciences promotes research on the "emerging India": social management of water, urban development, demography and social mobility, microfinance and indebtedness, "traditional" and "modern" health care systems, urban planning, agroecology, etc. The Department of Ecology concentrates its research on biodiversity and notably on the functioning of fragile ecosystems (forests, mangroves, littoral, etc. ), by considering man as an important parameter in their evolution. It conducts research that aims to understand and evaluate the biological diversity of natural ecosystems as well as those affected by human impact. This research activity has the related aim of contributing to the establishment of schemes for conservation and sustainable management of natural resources. The high priority accorded to research on paleo-environments has yielded a rich and varied collection of pollen. The research conducted at GeoSMIT is both methodological (development of new approaches in remote sensing and computer sciences) and thematic (study of a vegetal or human environment through satellite observation, development of an interactive portal, methods for the analysis of regional biodiversity...). Transversal, interdisciplinary programmes have been launched to break the boundaries of these departments: Coast, Labour, Forest and Water. Missions 
RESEARCH: field work and data collection, organization of scientific events, response to calls for projects, publication of books and academic articles...
TRAINING: receiving students on internship, master, doctoral and post-doctoral students from France and other countries. EXPERTISE: manuscript analysis, pollen study for archaeology, Smart Cities project of the Government of Puducherry, collaboration with the Agence Française de Développement... This last mission is growing. More generally, IFP is open to any partnership with companies, foundations and other organizations: sponsorship, research collaborations or expertise - financing projects, PhDs, chairs, etc. Support structures for research
 The library: Its collection (on line catalogue) comprises 70,000 books and 800 journals, of which 140 are regularly subscribed; library open to all. 8500 palm-leaf manuscripts (the largest collection of texts on Saivasiddhanta in the world, registered as such in the "Memory of the World" register of the UNESCO). IFP is regarded as a "Manuscript Resource Centre" by the National Mission for Manuscripts of the Government of India); 1144 transcripts, many of them being published with critical edition (see below). A collection of 140,000 photographs, of temples and edifices in South India notably. The international police is making use of it for tracking stolen statues. Another collection is being built, on the history of family photography in Tamil Nadu (programme STARS). Pollen slide collection (Dr. Thanikaimoni pollen reference slide collection): 22,000 slides in 15,000 tropical plant species. The Herbarium houses nearly 23,000 specimens. Nearly 3,000 maps on India and South and Southeast Asia, around 1,200 topographic maps (1 inch : 1 mile) dating from the first half of the 20th century and an equal number of topographic maps at the metric scale (most of them 1:50,000 and nearly 200 sheets at 1:250,000) obtained from the Survey of India and covering most of the Indian subcontinent. Around 500 thematic maps of other South and Southeast Asian countries (vegetation, soil, geology, meteorology, etc.) at highly varying scales, mainly from the 1950s, are preserved. 