From an Arctic Expedition to a Waste Management Social Enterprise
By Neelima Mishra
In June 2019, I was a part of an 80 member team selected from all over the world to take part in the Climate Force Arctic Expedition. Our leader was Sir Robert Swan, the first person in history to walk to both the Poles.
The Expedition was an eye-opener as it enlightened me about the threats our planet faces from climate change, waste and single use plastic as well. While hiking across the highlands, we stumbled across plastic cigarette lighters, bottles, bottle caps, toothbrushes, fishing nets, and other items, which showed me the grave reality of our actions. One of our naturalists onboard also mentioned: “If you’re holding a phone watching/reading this, you probably have the privilege to make choices in your everyday actions, whether it’s planting a tree, riding a bike, buying local, using less single-use plastic or even just educating yourself.”
Post returning to Odisha, the daily walk from our workplaces showed sights that we just could not keep ignoring any more. We were exposed to the perils of the waste-pickers, usually children, who rummaged through the trash, the animals who fed on the litter and the degrading quality of the landscape the city once took pride in. Our collective determination to take action about the burgeoning waste problem in the city took shape in the form of a waste management venture and thus Ceiba Green Solutions was born in December 2019. Ceiba is derived from the genus of the Indian red silk cotton tree also known as Semul or Indian kapok. The for-profit social enterprise, based out of Bhubaneswar, capital of Odisha, commits to come up with plausible solutions and initiatives to deal with the growing waste problem in our city.
Our solutions are focused on promoting composting and waste segregation activities at the household level, apartments and societies through our in-house developed composting setup. Thus, empowering citizens to divert their kitchen waste from the landfill, reduce GHG emissions and also build nutrient-rich soil. We are also raising awareness through workshops including board games, expos and outreach activities with schools, corporates and organizations to inspire positive actions on the environment.
Our discussions and dialogues on sustainability at the NELIS (Next Leaders Initiative in Sustainability) Asia Summit at Singapore led to various emphases around food, agriculture, water, resources and energy and it has been interesting to see how conversations highlight the growing gap between developing and developed countries. This thriving forum also gave me the opportunity to be a mentor at the Circular Innovation Jam 2020, taking place across 5 countries in South and Southeast Asia. In spite of being a nascent startup, we guided students mostly, on how to fine tune their ideas and work towards solutions for a sustainable future. It gave me hope that we indeed are a collective working for the greater good of the planet and its resources.
With the pandemic, our planned social activities were limited however, the crisis was an opportunity and we came up with an ecommerce platform Ceiba Store. It is a curated marketplace for promoting reusable, truly biodegradable and earth-friendly products, thus helping people champion the switch from a single-use plastic mindset to a reusable one. This was also supported by the fact that I had taken up the #PlasticFreeJuly challenge in 2018. Just deciding to make a few simple switches and finding better alternatives for few single-use plastic items was where my journey began! Products like menstrual cups, and pads, shampoo bars, bamboo toothbrushes are some of the very simple shifts I made. It made me realize that this marketplace also supports small businesses, a local economy unlike mass manufactured products , thus contributing to a better environment too.
Yes, we’re living in the age of convenience, but that doesn’t mean we can’t be sustainable at the same time. “Cumulatively small decisions, choices, actions, make a very big difference” — Jane Goodall
We at Ceiba Green, do believe that the power to make conscious changes rests with the individual and you are never too late to tread the path of sustainable living and take those little green steps. Hope you join us in our endeavor of keeping a beautiful Earth!