Over 110 volunteers from various schools, colleges, clubs, and corporates joined hands for a mega beach clean-up drive at Mumbai’s Girgaum Chowpatty beach, collecting 800 kgs of waste within two hours.
This clean-up drive was conducted under Project Waste No More, a large-scale public-private partnership-led project backed by SBI Foundation, BMC, and Hindustan Unilever.
The drive was also supported by Xynteo Vikaasa and Dalmia PolyPro.
This was the largest edition of the series of bi-monthly clean-up drives organised jointly by the five organisations, with ground support from Change Is Us, a youth-led volunteer group comprising local students and residents.
The waste collected was transported to a Xynteo-run facility in the D-ward for further treatment, where it was ultimately used as raw material for producing scores of products, including the t-shirts that the volunteers donned during the clean-up drive.
The drive also featured an art installation – a giant fish fashioned out of waste – symbolising an Ellen MacArthur Foundation study, which predicts that plastic would outweigh the fish in the oceans by 2050.
A team of volunteers also engaged with by-standers and educated them on the need to sort their waste and how they can do their bit to keep their city and streets clean.
Lalit Mohan, President & COO, SBI Foundation, said, “Recycling is a critical and topical movement that requires all hands-on deck – and the youth are leading this conversation in India, just like the rest of the world. Associating with diverse stakeholders and youth groups like Change Is Us has helped us take this cause to the mainstream in Mumbai.”
The ‘Waste No More’ initiative, an end-to-end waste management model, is being implemented in Mumbai’s D Ward in collaboration with BMC, Hindustan Unilever, and Dalmia PolyPro.
The project also engages youth groups like Change Is Us to conduct bi-monthly clean-up drives and raise door-to-door awareness about the merits of waste segregation at source.
Since its launch, over 3000 MT of dry waste and over 1500 MT of plastic waste have been successfully diverted from landfills and oceans.
This model is now being scaled up and piloted in Aurangabad District by the Maharashtra Government