Karukutty dons a green garb

KARUKUTTY (ERNAKULAM): Change, whatever its magnitude, can happen only with hard work on the ground. Or else, ideas will remain what they are: ideas. The Karukutty grama panchayat is aggressively pursuing an imaginative idea and an ambitious dream: former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam's dream of seeing a billion trees being planted all over India as part of the global ten billion trees programme.

It was during his visit here to inaugurate the second phase of the Haritha Keralam project this June 5 (World Environment Day) that Mr. Kalam put forth the mission of a billion trees for billion people of India over the coming three years as part of the global ten billion tree programme. Happy to note that eight million trees are proposed to be planted as part of the second phase of Haritha Keralam, the former President said: “Today, I can see the momentum of the movement in Karukutty panchayat.”

Now two years into its implementation, jointly by the panchayat and the Forest Department, the afforestation programme has evolved into a massive people's initiative in sustainable development.

From school students to women members of Kudumbasree units, hundreds are participating in the green mission of the panchayat, thereby setting an admirable example in ecological conservation involving the local community.

Pointing out that the panchayat had planted roughly 25,000 saplings under Haritha Keralam during 2009-10, Karukutty panchayat president K.K. Shibu says that the mission became a success because of the enthusiastic support extended by Kudumbasree units, school students, voluntary organisations and libraries.

“Households too have taken enthusiastically to the project and have planted around 7,000 saplings so far,” Mr. Shibu says. Karukutty Naipunya Public School Principal Fr. Benny Maramparampil is happy that the eco-club members of his school are contributing their mite to greening the panchayat, a dry region for several years.

Adopting trees

Anupriya Babu, a student of Class X and an active eco-club member, is all pride as she points out that the students have adopted the newly planted trees on the campus. “We students bring manure from our homes and tend each sapling well,” she says. Jacob Paulson, another nature lover in the school, puts the number of saplings planted on the campus at 120.

Students have not stopped there, says Lailamma Zacharia, headmistress of the Government Upper Primary School, Pallissery, who points out that the students of her school have also begun raising a vegetable garden besides planting the tree saplings.

With the panchayat offering all support, the school has plans to launch many more environment protection programmes in the new academic year, she says.

Source: The Hindu, 30th June 2010

For Chembilode panchayat, plastic is not a menace

CHEMBILODE (KANNUR): You may be greeted with a frown if you carry plastic carry bags when visiting Chembilode panchayat. This is a place which has been trying hard to tackle the plastic menace for years now and has learnt the hard way that it is impossible to wish it away just like that. Chembilode is also a panchayat that has gone ahead and tried on its own ways to keep the menace under check and is, now, one of the few panchayats that has been able to get over the top of the problem.

For Chembilode, it has been a fairly long journey from the largely ineffectual plastic ban to plastic recycling to manufacture of value- added products. When it went in for the conventional route of plastic ban, it found plastic bags popping up all over the place in spite of all that it did to create awareness of its hazardous consequences. That is when the panchayat decided to set up a plant to reprocess the waste into granules. Soon, a 13-member Self-Help Group (SHG) was entrusted with the task of turning the granules into plastic rope with financial assistance from the Edakkad Block Panchayat. “The recycling and reprocessing units in our panchayat were the first such initiatives by any local body in the State,” says panchayat vice-president M.V. Anil Kumar.

“Although the plant has the capacity to recycle 300 kg of plastic a day, the plastic waste generated in the panchayat comes to only 10 per cent of that. We are trying to link up with the other eight panchayats in the Edakkad block to ensure that there is adequate supply of plastic waste to make the plant viable,” says C.K. Babu, secretary of the SHG.

The panchayat is now planning to buy a vehicle to collect plastic waste from its 6,380 households and shops at the Chakkarakkal market area in the panchayat.

“Without public support, this initiative would have failed,” says K. Damodaran, a bank employee and resident of Koyyod in the panchayat. M. Musthafa, leader of the Indian Union Muslim League and member of the panchayat, notes that all such good initiatives prove successful only due to consensus among all members of the panchayat and adds, “Our plastic recycling plant is a model for the entire State.”

Source: The Hindu, 29th June 2010