A glimpse from the ‘Gobar Times: Walk The Talk,’ a Fancy Dress Fun Fiesta organized as part of the Green Schools Carnival 2024 held on 30 January 2024 at the India Habitat Centre, New Delhi.

All the fashionistas of the Gobar Times: Walk The Talk, showcasing their style quotient with chic aesthetics, inspired by the diverse covers of the Gobar Times (GT)! Through their understanding and vision of sustainability, these contestants imagined an out-of-the-box, ramp-worthy dress that triggered environmental consciousness among our audience...

Waste segregation is mandated in several states in India. But most of the plastic waste ends up in landfills instead of being recycled as barely 30 per cent of it is sorted correctly. Hence, the need of the hour is to educate people about segregating, composting, and recycling waste through aggressive awareness programs by community and self-help groups. So, don’t be a foolish donkey and dispose of your waste properly. 

From trash mountains to waste segregation, a high-schoolers research and observation through the dump yards.

The garbage mountains along the Yamuna, reminded me of the dystopian scenes from the movie Idiocracy (2006), in which people living in the shadows of such mountains get buried under an avalanche of trash. Hence, I embarked upon a quest to explore solutions to such colossal challenges and this journey took me the sites in and around my city, Chandigarh.

Since 2019, I was associated with door-to-door campaigns for waste segregation in Mohali. Awarded as the Cleanest City in Punjab in 2023, I delved into this strategy of sorting waste at its origin. That demonstrated to me the possibility of successfully implementing sustainable solutions—like composting, recycling, and generating Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF). However, despite legal subsidies, challenges still lay in institutionalizing source segregation—in maintaining the momentum for its campaigns an

Child waste pickers in India need our help and compassion. Imagine waking up really early, when the sun is just starting to peek through. Imagine putting on a pair of your most ragged, worn-out clothes, picking up your work-gear – a large, equally tattered bag, maybe. And then, trudging out to begin another day, not for school, but for doing what you do every day of the week: pick up waste. Thousands of children in our country do this every day. You can see them scurrying along streets and footpaths with their oversized bags slung on their thin shoulders, rummaging through garbage dumps. They are the unsung ‘green warriors’ of our times – waste pickers who help keep our cities and towns clean.

With 'Say No to Plastics' – a MasterClass with Sid and ‘Through My Lens’ photography contest – Meet the Winners

World Menstrual Hygiene Day 2023: Small-scale incinerators for sanitary pad disposal in schools is not a good idea. Lack of monitoring and emission of harmful gases like dioxins and furans within poorly designed, substandard toilets are major risks posed by small-scale incinerators.

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The theme of Menstrual Hygiene Day 2023 is to make menstruation a normal fact of life by 2030. The predominant objective is to create a world where no one is held back because they menstruate…

Performing tangible actions to achieve credible solutions—making eco-friendly cleaning agents and raising awareness on chemically-intense products to control pollution.

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The unsettling sight of the Bellandur Lake—a foamy, cloudy demon gargling bubbles—and plastic litter—baffling mounds disposed irresponsibly—motivated me to act and revive our wonderful world. We all know that the climate crisis is going off the charts and the practise of ‘Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle’ is gaining alarming urgency. Thus, it’s high time that we all think about saving our nature...

The story of how a village got its first toilet.

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G Nandakumar is a young farmer in Diguvapalem, a remote hamlet and a chronically drought-prone area in southern Andhra. In 2019, I met him on a school hiking trip, as part of our Geography classes. 'Nandu,' fondly addressed as so, was keen to upgrade his village by pursing some sustainable environmental practices, like organic farming. However, he lacked the resources to execute his vision. So, as a young student, I was very inspired by his ideas and wanted to help...

“Such a beautiful place, to be with friends”. Fans of the Harry Potter film series will remember this line, uttered in one of the most heart-breaking scenes of the saga by arguably the most beloved character of them all, Dobby the house-elf. As the adorable elf breathes his last in the arms of his friend and hero, Harry Potter, he inadvertently invites viewers to marvel at the vast, expansive beach that then becomes his gravesite.

Twelve years after...

Entrepreneurial projects and learning-by-doing activities help build environmental consciousness among young school children.

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Our surroundings are indispensable to our survival. Hence, environmental conservation has become a high priority the world over, owing to climate crisis, pollution, land degradation, etc. Environmental awareness can be attained by changing the attitude...

A look around any supermarket and one thing will be hard to miss: plastic.

Every item small or big, from perishables to ones with a long shelf life is packed in plastic. Even the ones that have a covering of their own, say, oranges are needlessly packaged. The fruit is even peeled, kept on a delicate foam tray, and sealed with a plastic sheet. Apples are individually wrapped in comfortable cushions made of plastic. Gourds are packed in cling films. It’s almost as if humans think that their artificial packaging, which is wreaking havoc on the planet, is better than that of nature...

What are Micro-Plastics?

Micro-plastics have not been defined in particular. They are just tiny particles that result from the disintegration of bigger plastic materials. However, most researchers say that any plastic smaller than 5 millimetres in size is a micro-plastic. Hence, these are really, really teeny-tiny!

Plastics are made up of polymers, which are derived from fossil fuels. A whole lot of chemicals are added to the polymers—close to 10,000—to ensure that a given plastic has the desired properties...

How much can you put at stake to help Mother Earth? Do you think sustainability is a trend? This article answers these questions and peers into mending one’s lifestyle, beginning from the clothes that you buy.

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The environment is connected to almost every aspect of our lives, from what we eat and wear to the choices we make on a daily basis like taking the car or cycling down to the supermarket...

Do we ever stop to think where all the trash that we produce goes? Most of it heads to a dumpsite – yes, those mountains of waste that you might have seen on one of your trips around the city. Let's dig into this subject a bit, shall we?

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A huge dark mountain is looming up amidst houses and buildings, with a flock of crows and eagles circling over it. As one goes closer, you can see people on it...

A resolution by Leaders to save humanity from drowning in ‘Plastic’.

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On March 2, 2022, representatives from over 200 countries gathered in Nairobi, Kenya for the continued fifth session of the United Nations Environment Assembly. The assembly then created history when 175 countries unanimously agreed on a United Nations framework to fight global plastic pollution from cradle to grave...

India has more than 1.5 million schools and 260 million students. Think about a regular day in these schools before the pandemic. Imagine the amount of waste— food waste, plastic, paper, stationery—produced in these schools in a day. Now, add COVID-19 waste to it as schools across the country are reopening. Imagine all of this waste going to landfills. Alarming, isn’t it?

The market today is flooded with bright, shiny toys and soft clothes for babies. But how is this related to microplastics in their feces?

The market today is flooded with bright, shiny toys and soft clothes for babies. But how is this related to microplastics in their feces? Most products today like sipper cups, lunch boxes, baby bottles and wiping napkins are made of a substance called PET or polyethylene terephthalate. PET is taken from natural gas and crude oil. It is also another version of the polyester fabric...

Plastic pollution creates an evolutionary trap for young sea turtles, says a new study. The study is done by researchers from the University of Exeter, UK. The study included 121 sea turtles from five of the world’s seven species: green, loggerhead, hawksbill, olive ridley, and flatback.

They found plastic inside juvenile turtles along both the east and west coasts of Australia. Sea turtles usually hatch on beaches and spent their early years traveling on ocean currents...

A group of college students from South Delhi's Aryabhatta college has started a unique initiative. They call it Project Palaash. Project Palaash aims to salvage floral waste and create organic dyes that are purely non-synthetic in nature. These organic dyes are then used on fabrics. These fabrics are dyed by the socially and economically underprivileged, thereby creating employment opportunities for destitute community members.

In the era of fast fashion, things are made quickly and for a fraction of the cost but end up being expensive for the environment. Today, the textile industry is one of the most polluting industries in the world and in India, it is the third-largest source of waste after plastic, paper and compost.