A refreshingly sweet and innocent observation by a child of an otherwise very worrying issue of—river pollution—with a heartwarming appeal for water conservation. Once upon a time, during the holidays, I was travelling from Delhi to my village nearby. On the way, we guys came across the Yamuna River. Looking at the river, my younger brother instantly commented, “It doesn’t snow in Delhi even during winters. But here, on the river, it seems to have snowed in peak summers!”... Then, I explained to him that the white foam on the river surface is not snow but the chemical effluents emitted by huge …

An alert issued regarding unhealthy packaged foods, and how food nutrition labels can and cannot help us to become aware. ************************************************************************************** I know you all kids must be excited about Dusshera and Diwali. The whole month you’ll be exchanging sweets and offering scrumptious feasts. Our friends and families will enjoy beautifully wrapped gifts of savouries— chocolates, candies, chips, soft drinks, and what not! Their advertisements will flood our television screens and social media, and even masquerade as a renewed form of celebration with the …

Born out of a desire to make a difference and a positive impact on the world, let’s hear about Clo_ser from the founder herself. Clo_ser stands for Clothes for a Sustainable Environment & Resources. It was started in June 2022. It is an initiative that focuses on sustainable fashion, utilising leftover scraps from the fashion and textiles industry; these scraps are upcycled to economically empower women and enhance their skill-based learning. The initiative also helps in preventing textile wastes from reaching landfills and joining the other kinds of wastes that are smothering our cities.

Let’s delve into the what, why & how of composting. ave you wondered how a plastic toothbrush can lie around on Earth for hundreds of years but an apple core disappears in a few weeks? This happens when we let nature do its thing, and the superheroes that make it all possible are microorganisms or microbes. Microbes are tiny living things found all around us that are so small that they can’t be seen with naked eyes. These superheroes break down all organic matter— coming directly from plants or animals, even something as tough as a bone. Read on as we walk you through the basics of composting — from …

An ‘earth construction’ session on building sustainably. DIY included too!

Day 1: Here We Go! | Drill: Chop, Chat, Chew! | Skill: Learn how to make some cool summer drinks and recipes, using local foods in a cook-long kitchen | Thrill: Serving a cooler and a yummy recipe...  Day 2: Here We Stay! | Drill: Nature in a Nest | Skill: Learn how to make a bird’s nest by using and recycling waste materials in a build-along workshop | Thrill: Crafting a functional bird’s nest and creating wealth-from-waste...

A future fuelled by biofuels is far better than that fired on fossil fuels. Read why biofuels are a panacea for reducing air pollution caused through automobiles and farm fields, how they help manage farm waste, and enhance soil health. ********************************** Rahul: Hey Anu! You look disgusted. Not knowing what to do about these monumental, stinking garbage bins?Anu: Yeah, dude! Why don’t people deliberate upon solution-seeking rather than piling their sins right outside their homes!? Household waste has a lot of organic waste and am sure there are ways of dealing with it!...

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...

All about cracking the climate code with the Annual Climate Change Quiz in the Carnival’24. ******************* Young climate warriors from different parts of the country battled it out for the coveted title of the ultimate Climate Champions in The Bout — Green School’s Programme (GSP) annual climate quiz for schools. Organised as a signature event of the Green Schools Programme Carnival & Awards Ceremony at the India Habitat Centre on 30 January 2024, the second edition of The Bout was double the fun and double the adrenaline! Over 35 school teams, consisting students from Grades 6 to 10, participated …

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 …

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 …