Back To Roots

[Music]

to live with different identities

is fun from ex-isro scientist

to innovative urban farmer to kurewali

madam

i have been living with diverse

identities

since past few years kudewali madam

being the funniest one

that used to be the salutation that i

received from domestic helps and

community guards

when i visited them either to teach

waste management

or to collect some organic waste from

them

of course a modern looking urban woman

is not commonly seen picking up dry

leaves from the roadside

or collecting used cardboards and news

papers

from households or the juice waste from

the juice vendors

this is the story of my journey back to

roots

i took this journey into higher gears in

2012

when i noticed wastage of natural

resources

in urban horticulture in the residential

society that i was living in

i was living in one of the most urban

cities of my country

my residential society was blessed with

a beautiful

landscape of native trees wide variety

of plants

and lush green lawns the society

housekeeping maintained this landscape

neat and clean by sweeping off every

fallen leaf

cut branch and clipped grass

i started noticing that a huge amount of

horticulture waste

left my society every day

i learned that this horticulture waste

was being

dumped in landfills or was being burned

i also noticed that chemical inputs

were bought from the market to fulfill

the nutrient needs of the landscape the

manures were bought

the chemical inputs made plants and soil

more

thirsty in summer so we bought more

water

perturbed over this complete imbalance

of

ecology and economy i decided

to do something for this landscape

and to restore the balance i first

started working

towards educating the horticulture team

to put back dry leaves under the trees

i knew that this mulch would not

only save on water the nutrient

requirements

and the manure requirements of the

landscape but it also would save a lot

of money

spent on fuel main hour

and buying chemical inputs

taking an opportunity of a community

gathering on the independence day

celebration

in 2012 i kick-started

a campaign on awareness of waste

management

at source few school going children came

forward

and demonstrated the easy ways of home

composting kitchen waste

i with the support of estate management

and few like-minded residents

kick-started a pilot project of treating

horticulture

waste at source within my community

this needed a bare hundred square feet

of community land

and rupees 1600 as investment to cordon

of this land peace

the estate management happily gave me a

suitable piece of land

and i put those 1600 rupees from my own

pocket

we practiced a regimented discipline for

three

months and soon a part of horticulture

waste was converted into 700 kilograms

of compost

which i call black gold within those

three months

many households in the community had

learned to segregate

waste and also had composted their own

kitchen waste

to result into this black gold

this mere sight of black gold started a

chain of positive reactions in my

community

the estate management realized the easy

management ways of waste at home

the estate management soon realized

the skewed economics of disposing of the

horticulture waste and

buying manures for the landscape

society started discussing over getting

some good composting solutions to manage

1200 households based

and the horticulture waste from 300

acres of land

my trees and landscape started getting

the compost

back to their roots actually where it

belonged

still not satisfied over the speed of

this development

vis-a-vis the volume of horticulture

ways that still

left my society every day i decided

to do something on my individual level

and lead by example

i soon gathered 900 cubic feet of

horticulture waste

some waste from the cane juice vendors

and my own kitchen waste

i carried this entire vase to my rooftop

of my own home which is only 600 square

feet to do

justice to this small area i treated

this volume of

waste into three different batches

i treated this entire waste over 450

days

150 days each batch

by the end of 150 days i had got

a beautiful organically rich growing

soil

a soil called amrit methi

the soil technique that i had learnt

from my teacher

late shri deepak such day

the amrit mitti soon covered every

square inch of my garden

area around my home on four different

levels

and i soon started growing my own

vegetables

and fruits on my rooftop in my balcony

and around

the small patch of land that was

available around my home

this is how the amrita mitti looks like

and i’m talking to you from the rooftop

of second floor of my home

and what you see behind me is a custard

apple tree

the flat beans wine and the turmeric

plants

this is my rooftop yielding food for my

family

organically grown grown nutritious

food into the soil converted

from kitchen waste and horticulture

waste of my society

i soon started enjoying all the benefits

of this sustainability cycle

the cycle from kitchen to roof and roof

to kitchen

grey water recycling biodiversity that

otherwise

was getting extinct and distant from the

urban

areas less energy required to cool my

home

i was proud of my journey i started

sharing my experiences

widely with my community fellow members

and also through social media platforms

i my this journey as garbage to greens

later my this venture was extensively

covered

by the national television network of my

country

i started getting many phone calls

phone calls of appreciation few people

wanted to know waste segregation

few people wanted to know how to compost

kitchen waste at home

few people wanted to grow their own food

few people wanted me to provide them

the ready amritimity inspired by the

inquiries

and understanding the urban constitution

constraint of space and time

to treat a voluminous waste at source

i took this chance to conduct

an extensive research and development

to create organically resource

to be able to provide to urban gardeners

across the country

again with guidance from my teacher late

shri deepak sujdeji

and with his hand holding i started

researching

with the stubble waste soon

i converted stubble waste of heat wheat

rice and bajra into organically rich

soil that was the eureka moment of my

life

riding over this momentum of this moment

i soon established my own company

enriched soil and soul private limited

this company started processing

agriculture waste horticulture

waste and stubble waste from the farmers

and converting it into organic soils

a huge volume of such waste was getting

converted

inspired by late shri dr dabhar kharji’s

principle of neighborhood resources

i established a processing unit of my

company

into a small village of farmers

which had all the required inputs within

two kilometer

kilometers of the periphery

i trained and employed two farmer

families

from the same village to work in my

processing unit

i was happy and satisfied

soon i started supplying

these soils through e-commerce platforms

and the soil started reaching to urban

areas of almost every state of my

country

with more and more demands from the

urban gardeners

seven types of organic soils had taken

birth in my processing unit

i quote madhuru sultan puri jee’s

magari

i realized every word of the shade into

my this journey

i was happy through the social media

we had created a big family

a global family of people who do not

send their waste to landfills

who treat their own kitchen waste at

source

who grow their own food we hand hold

each other and we share our experiences

widely

to be able to manage our own waste at

source

soon i started noticing other organic

matter waste around me

while traveling to my processing unit i

noticed fallen trees

and i started creating garden

accessories from the fallen trees

i started noticing industrial waste wood

and i started creating lightweight

planters

suitable for rooftop farming in urban

areas

my this global family includes people

from all walks of life

and crosses all the boundaries

soon people from colder countries

started calling me

to understand how to convert kitchen

waste into compost in colder

temperatures

and people also started calling to

understand

how to grow food in the small urban

spaces

in desert like conditions the family is

ever growing

the family includes from students to

vice chancellors to doctors to engineers

to mali’s to chefs

to homemakers

and we hand hold each other beautifully

my society today treats

waste from 1200 households

and horticulture waste from 300 acres of

land

now my society’s landscape uses recycled

water

uses dry leaves as mulch and

we have reduced a lot of money

to buy chemical inputs

this is the story

and the campaign that i started from

garbage

to greens and eat what you grow

and grow what you eat i believe

that waste and resource are two

different

ways of looking at the same thing

so do not waste your waste

if you cannot avoid generating waste

then learn to manage it at source

if you feel that to consume food is your

right

then to grow in however small volumes

should be your responsibility

green foodscapes over the rooftops

and no landfills should be the signature

of our education

let us all give back

to the roots thank you