1. Plant a tree
Get your kids to plant a tree in your garden or a surrounding neighborhood area. Get them to water the tree every day and spend a few minutes taking care of it. You could make some of your visits to the tree even more interesting by asking them to name their tree, paint or draw the tree, take a selfie, etc. A great way to get this started is to encourage your child to plant a tree on their birthday. This way, they have a companion that grows with them, who they can celebrate with every year!

2. Play the Recycling game
Recycling can be an incredibly fun activity that could also bring out the creative best in the family. As an example, give your child a box/ bottle to be recycled with some paint, ribbons, adhesive etc and join the fun! Not only will the outcome be a treasure, but the child will realize that a box that was about to be thrown can become an object of wonder!

3. Walk in the park
Forest bathing in many cultures is regarded as a therapeutic experience that brings about a calming sense of well-being. A walk in the park with your child along with some interesting activities like identifying new plants, talking to the gardeners, learning about native biodiversity, collecting flowers and seeds is a lovely way of making an everlasting connection. While strolling through the park, you can engage the children in a game of cleaning up the area around them. This will instill a practice of keeping natural surroundings free from trash, and will help them become ambassadors for a cleaner future. Do remember to carry a yummy treat for the little one as a reward!

4. Create an Environmental Volunteering Game
Each time your child does an environmentally conscious act such as switching off the lights, using less water, etc reward them by giving them points, badges, treats etc. Get your child to make a board where the points and badges can be displayed. Each badge is recommended to be awarded with some fanfare and hugs!

5. Adopt a pet
Having pets is a wonderful way to get your child connected with the natural world. Sometimes when it is not possible to keep a pet in the house, get your child to interact with friendly pets in the neighborhood and build the connection. They can also volunteer their time to walk or feed the pets if the opportunity arises.

6. Celebrate special days
There are several days in the year such was the World Environment Day, Water Day, Biodiversity Day, Pet Day etc that can be occasions to celebrate. Wear green outfits, throw a party for their friends, organize a quiz etc – these are great ways to make the day memorable. Just ensure, all your party themes and supplies are biodegradable in nature, so your celebration has the benefit of being both fun and mindful!

7. The Jungle Book
Read books and stories to them about nature and fire up their imagination through the experiences of the natural world! Encourage them to make their own stories and create their very own version of the Jungle Book.

8. Plant questions and thoughts
Children in early years are exploring cause and effect, and the consequences of their actions. This is a perfect time to introduce the positive and negative impacts they can have on the environment with some intriguing and thought-provoking questions.
As an example, what happens to our rubbish when we throw it ‘away’ or recycle it? What happens to seeds when we sow them? Why buy when one can repair? How can we reduce our environmental footprint?

9. Conserve
Teach kids how to conserve existing resources – water and food, for example. Remind them to put food back in the refrigerator and close the door. There are numerous creative ways to conserve water, food, gas, and other products once you put your mind to it. Turn it into a game!

10. Ride bikes but walk whenever possible.
This is great exercise and saves not only gas but time because you don’t have to drop your kids off everywhere.

The truth is that climate change and climate actions can sometimes be abstract topics. It is by creating experiences and environmental volunteering interactions that as parents lasting impact can be created. As they say the best time to volunteer is now!

The post 10 Tips About Environmental Volunteering to Teach Your Children appeared first on The Sacred Groves.

It is estimated that 20 billion shoes are produced every year. Of these, about 350 million are thrown away every year in the US alone. And they are non-biodegradable. In 2014, athletes Shriyans Bhandari and Ramesh Dhami considered the several pairs of expensive sports shoes they had to discard every year and came up with an idea. Why not recycle the soles of their discarded sports shoes into new shoes? While they were no longer optimum for running, they would do nicely under a pair of slippers… Without any background or experience in shoe manufacturing, the duo probably didn’t even realise that their idea was novel and audacious. Soon, they were able to patent two of their industrial designs and roll out their first line of recycled shoes in 2015. This is how Greensole, a social startup that not only recycles old shoes into new footwear but also distributes them to the barefoot in 13 Indian states, was born.

“Going barefoot exposes people to injuries, parasitic infections and worse. Yet, while food, drinking water and shelter are considered basic to their well-being, wearing shoes is often overlooked,” says Bhandari. “Our retail business and corporate funding ensures that we are able to put shoes on the feet of countless people in the country.”

Here’s what happens to old shoes, once they reach Greensole’s manufacturing unit in Navi Mumbai. After a thorough wash, their uppers and lowers are separated. The lowers are resized; uppers cut for use as straps and laces used in shoe packaging. Even the shoe recycling has a low carbon footprint as it is manually done. The shoes, sold online with minimal advertising, have developed a cult following in India. They’ve featured twice in the India Fashion Week – last in 2019 in collaboration with noted fashion designers Abraham and Thakore.

Partnering with heavyweight corporates such as the Tata Group, Rolls Royce, international shoe brands like Adidas, Crocs and Skechers and over 60 others, Greensole organises old shoe collection and new shoe distribution drives across the country.

“In 2020, we distributed 400,000 shoes to those in need, including returning migrants at Mumbai’s railway stations,” says Bhandari. Corporates front the approximate US$2.7 needed to recycle a single pair of shoes, to be distributed in communities of their choice. Many of them have also organised shoe collection drives with their employees. Meanwhile, Greensole’s retail sales also contribute to their charity work, with a percentage from every shoe sold going into their charity arm. In 2018, Bhandari and co-founder Ramesh Dhami were listed in Forbes’ 30 Under 30 list of Asian social entrepreneurs. The same year, they inaugurated their first skilling in Jharkhand, to train women to recycle shoes.

The Greensole model is replicable in countries where low cost manual labour is easily available. Most of all, it is timely. Not only does it reduce the load on the planet’s overflowing landfills, it makes for the barefoot and fashionistas alike, shoes that truly have a soul!

Author: Geetanjali Krishna, The India Story Agency for Sacred Groves
Images credit: Greensole

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In 2005, when Dhammalangkaro moved to Bangkok to teach Buddhism and manage Chak Daeng’s temple grounds, he found it full of garbage. Back then, plastic waste there was either burnt or thrown in River Chao Phraya. Sadly, this resulted in severe pollution in the river, contributing to the loss of marine life, poisoning of aquifers and the uncontrolled growth of algae. Burning plastic also resulted in severe air pollution. About eleven years ago, he visited Tzu Chi Foundation in Taiwan to study plastic recycling and saw how they were able to make shirts, trousers, bags and more from recycled plastic. Thus, the idea of making monastic robes from recycled plastic was born.

Today, he and other monks in the monastery sift through all the plastic waste they receive from neighbouring areas. This plastic is compressed into bales and shipped to the factory where it is converted into fibre and eventually woven into monastic robes.

Monks attest that the fabric is easy to wash, doesn’t smell or crease and is light on skin. Their novel recycling enterprise has employed over 30 local villagers, including some that are differently abled. Most of all, it is keeping some plastic from being thrown in the Chao Phraya river, one of the most polluted water sources in Thailand. For the monks of course, their clean up and recycling project has a spiritual aspect: “We need to clean material waste out, as well as cleaning the waste in the brain, and then, we will find true happiness,” the abbot says.

Image Story

Author: The India Story Agency for Sacred Groves
Images Credit: Luke Duggleby

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“How many lives has this purse saved?” says Isatou Ceesay, 48, toting a pretty, pale blue woven handbag.

Raised in Njau, a humble village in The Gambia, from a young age Ceesay was struck by the environmental degradation caused by the overuse and poor disposal of waste. The rivers in her rural region of the West African state were clogged with plastic bags, with the burning or dumping of toxic waste leading to a host of health implications for her fellow villagers, from respiratory illnesses to cholera, as well as sickening the livestock communities depended upon.

“The idea of recycling came to me very young, when I looked at the environment I lived in and people didn’t have the idea of taking care of their waste, “Ceesay says. “People were simply not aware of what I was talking about.” But Ceesay had social barriers to overcome in making the villagers understand the benefits of good environmental custodianship. “I was very young, I lacked money and I was uneducated,” Ceesay says. “But one thing I did have was commitment.” Plus, she adds, with a smile: “I wanted to prove them all wrong.”

What a difference two decades make. Today Ceesay’s revolutionary community recycling project, Njau Recycling and Income Generation Group (NRIGG), employs 1,100 people in four separate communities in the Gambia. The project proceeds on the basis that many of the items that are poorly disposed of by Gambian communities have reuse value. Using novel crafting methods, NRIGG employs marginalised women to make recycled bags, mats, purses and jewellery for resale at markets or via the charity’s site from reclaimed items, including plastic bags, and the plastic bottles that are the scourge of local waterways. The organisation also trains unemployed women to be community waste and recycling experts, training villagers in composting and recycling, kitchen gardening and the societal benefits in planting trees. This advocacy work, Ceesay says, has improved child and maternal weight and wellbeing in the communities her organisation works with. “When I return to a village and see there are vegetables growing, the environment is clean and nutrition has improved, that’s the best thing for me,” Cessay says.

NRIGG is now turning its attention to forest preservation, perfecting a simple method of making compacted cooking fuel from discarded kindling and coconut shells to prevent deforestation for charcoal. “This is important,” Ceesay says. “Without forests we cannot have a healthy life.”

For Ceesay, social justice goes hand-in-hand with good environmental stewardship. “If women and young people are not part of this work it will not have a future,” she says. She has recently launched a project that gives recycling work to disabled Gambian women who otherwise have little option but to beg. “They are some of the best workers we have,” she says, “but society sees them as having no worth.” Now Ceesay’s dream is to see more women taking leadership positions in African countries. “That is something we are really lacking,” Cessay says.

Apart from Ceesay, of course. In 2012, the environmental trailblazer was recognised with an award at The International Alliance for Women Difference Maker award in the USA. In her homeland, she’s popularly nicknamed the Queen of Recycling, a moniker she doesn’t mind one bit. “When I wake up every day I still have the heart to deliver a better life,” she says.

Isatou Ceesay was photographed for Climate Heroes, a documentary series about the women and men around the world who fight to protect our environment and mitigate climate change, climateheroes.org.

Learn how to recycle plastic bags into purses with Njau Recycling’s technique: Watch Here
Buy their creations at  One Plastic Bag

Author: The India Story Agency for Sacred Groves

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