Hands-on-deck to make namma ooru green

P Natarajan was a successful IT professional in the US for over a decade, but on returning to India a few years ago, he was shocked at the amount of trash thrown around and the lack of waste management. He was galvanised to set up a social enterprise that would focus on environmental-related projects like reducing the carbon footprint, increasing green cover, conserving water bodies and so on. That’s when Namma Ooru Foundation was born.

After creating a network of like-minded citizens to charter a mission for transforming communities, today Natarajan’s initiatives to convert areas in zero-waste zones, like Namma Thooimai, Namma School and Namma Kovil have been very popular.

“We have facilitated over 1,100 households in implementing waste segregation, and worked with schools and temples as well. Once private, Corporation or government schools sign up with us, they take a strict position of banning single-use plastics and other materials that are not environment-friendly, with all teachers, students and parents adhering to the rule. We conduct workshops, assess the different types of waste with a survey and then propose a solution. After monitoring them for three to six months, the school is certified green,” Natarajan explains.

With temples, they have to work with a wide range of visitors who enter the premises, which, Natarajan says, has been a ‘tough nut to crack’. “We have banned plastic usage in the temples that are signed with us, and segregation of wet and dry waste happens as well. Volunteers try to be present as much as possible to ensure the temple visitors follow the process.”

But, after bringing about a change with their schemes, now they have started a campaign, ‘Trash is Right’, with plans to transform 5,000 households, 100 schools and 50 temples in 2019. “We have begun a Ketto crowdfunding campaign to help us accomplish these goals. Our initiatives are currently run on a lean model with volunteers, and the scale and size of operations require additional dedicated resources to identify, manage and operate on the ground,” he says.