A treasure of waste

Bengaluru division of Social Venture Partnerships is organising a focused one-day event to leverage the learnings of some civic innovators, RWA's, associations, federations, large campuses and other stakeholders in the field of waste management. Experts in the space of SWM and resource support will also participate. Titled 'Wastex', this event will showcase civic innovations and cross-pollinate learnings and experiences from multiple stakeholders. The event is to be held at The Environment Management and Policy Research Institute, EMPRI at JP Nagar on December 1st from 9 am to 2:30 pm. Focused on civic innovation, Wastex aims to bring together the best civic innovators and showcase their work…

Where did that banana peel go? Where does it go when it leaves my home? Where does it go when it leaves my street? Where does it go when it leaves my city? We throw away so much. But where does it all go? Bengaluru city generates approximately 4,000 tonnes of waste everyday but where does this all go? Nobody cares where it goes, we only want it to leave our houses, our streets, our neighborhoods and our city. While there are policies like the ‘2 Bin 1 Bag’, which has been directed by the  Karnataka High Court to Bengalureans…

Written by Sowbhagya and translated from Kannada to English by Devaki Samuel It’s been twenty years since I started working as community organizer. I started as a teacher for children of 3-6 years of age. I noticed most of the time older sisters came to drop their younger siblings. The sisters were beautiful, smart and intelligent but had taken the burden of single mothers, who were involved in incense stick making. Deprived of education, instead of holding books, their hands were blackened with the ingredients of incense sticks. Whenever I saw them, my heart ached.  I had an opportunity to…

Indira, wastepicker from Bengaluru, made a passionate plea to world governments for recognizing contributions of wastepickers in ‘New Urban Agenda‘ during an event organized on the sidelines of United Nations (UN) Habitat III Prepcom at Surabaya, Indonesia. She emphasized on the fact that wastepickers keep the city clean. They save municipal corporations and local governments lot of money by channelizing waste for recycling. According to her, if an area generates 2 tons of waste, waste pickers take at-least a ton of waste from the same. They sort and sell it to the industry as raw material. This reduces the generated…

This is a story of hope. Of reclaiming a glorious city that had lost its beauty to the plastic curse. Of standing your ground and sticking your neck out for what you believe. Of collective, affirmative action. Of the power of the people that start from you and me. This story begins with the horrendous image of a beautiful city choking on its own garbage and ends with the reclamation of that same city by its loving citizens and thought leaders, who take on the plastic monster by its horns. A couple of months ago, it seemed like Bangalore city…

You are already composting your waste in aerobic method. As the logical next step meant to use the home-made compost, you have set up an organic vegetable garden. By now you are addicted to the fun of growing, eating, composting and re-growing. You want to maximise the yield, but don't want to spend on it. You have heard vermicompost is good for plants, but when you check the price for curiosity, here is how it looks.  On ebay, people sell a kg of vermicompost for 150 rupees! Sometimes it is even more - Rs 150 for 500 grams! In some…

No public meeting organiser ever takes in to consideration waste management. Whether it is an exhibition or a hunger strike, it is rare to see dustbins. Food stalls all around Freedom Park. Not a bin in site. Pic: Meera K. Hawkers and vendors naturally gravitate to any large group, selling icecreams, tea-coffee, groundnuts, roasted corn and more. They too never provide a bin to collect the waste. The visitors eat and throw trash in corners, sometimes just anywhere. Litter at Freedom Park. Pic: Meera K. At Freedom Park last week, visitors enthusiastically stuck stickers of I am Anna and wore…

National Games Village has taken a lead in creating a sustainable zero waste community. Tungabhadra block in the games village have been actively involved in managing the waste their homes generate within their complex for the past three months. It all started with inspiration from Vellore Srinivasan, who has 16 years of experience in implementing Zero Waste Management (ZWM) Projects and the non-profit group AID India coming forward to fund the initial cost of implementing ZWM in NGV. Segregating waste With tremendous support from residents, volunteers and the association, they kickstarted something that today can proudly be a shining example…

Last month, it was summer holidays time and the youngsters at Regalia Apartment in Malleswaram were missing waste management awareness campaigns that they loved doing. A call from Meenakshi Byre Gowda got them excited as they got a chance to talk and present their favorite topic 'managing waste at source'.In this video they are introducing WM to a group of citizens at 'Dignity Coffee Chavadi' of Vidyaranyapura. This meeting was arranged by Meenakshi who has been promoting waste management very enthusiastically. Malaika Vijay and Anugraha Anand have been the kid ambassadors of our campaign to create waste sensitive communities. ⊕

Meet Ganesh, a rapicker. I met him when we went around Malleswaram with our Corporator.  We were trying to create solutions for the road-side garbage dumping. Ganesh was retrieving recyclables from a dump near the Malleswaram Market on 9th cross. He was a very pleasant person and showed us his booty. I just started realising that he is an Eco Hero who is doing what we should be doing....Reduce ..Reuse ..Recycle. I see a big conflict there: that dump is his bread and butter while we were looking at eliminating it!  Creating alternative options for these workers will be a win-win situation…