In this ambassador report I would like to share about our Project which has been selected as Top 20 finalists whom SAYEN will provide seed funding. . I would like to thank Tunza Eco-Generation for posting about such opportunities and also SAYEN Handprint Challenge for believing us.

Sustainable and Ethical Waste Management Project (SEW) was purposed by 10 students (most of whom are eco-generation member as well) representing various faculties of Agriculture and Forestry University (AFU) under my leadership for SAYEN HANDPRINT CHALLENGE.

Our SEW Team members:

1. Rahul Acharya
2. Saroj Khatiwada
3. Aksana Dallakoti
4. Upakar Bhandari
5. Prashant Bhandari
6. Ritika Lamichane
7. Ashish Ghimire
8. Sandesh Khanal
9. Rohit Dhakal
10. Bibek Shrestha

Essence of our project:

AFU is recently established university consisting of two colleges Institute of Agriculture and Animal Science (IAAS), Rampur Chitwan (having history of more than 50 years) and Institute of Forestry, Heatauda. Giving focus to importance of agriculture, every year university is expanding both in terms of number of students and faculties. With this increasing in flow of students, waste management problem is skyrocketing. There are different buildings and Veterinary Hospital which create massive amount of wastes but their proper management is rarely seen. In fact, according to survey done by our team, each day one canteens( we have total 6 canteens) alone produces 22 kg of degradable wastes and  8.85 kg of non degradable wastes which mainly includes plastics and papers. These non degradable wastes are often burnt thus directly effecting our health and deteriorating environment by producing foul gases and chemical like dioxin, furan, mercury, plychlorinated biphenyls(PCBs) and so forth. In fact, many papers in the form of notes, books, and magazines are produced every year in dormitories which can be reused and send for recycling. So to change this scenario our team decided to take step of managing wastes and create healthy environment in university.

The main objectives of our Projects are:

• Aware everyone related to Universities about sustainable development issues
• Raise knowledge about concept of Degradable and Non Degradable wastes
• Teach about making compost manure and its advantages over commercial chemical fertilizer
• Promote 3Rs concept
• Engage youths into such programs and act as motivation for them
• Involve other sectors of university like dormitories/ hostels, canteens which often get ignored despite being integral part of University
• Improve sanitation condition of University
• Promote healthy environment and subsequently preserve biodiversity

Our Mode of Implementation:

Mass Awareness Campaign: Before doing anything which requires general support from public, we believe making them aware about what we are going to do is must. Its essential to make people know what?s happening in University. Keeping this in mind, we will launch mass awareness program collaborating with various youth clubs and organizations where we will invite our University professors, students, non teaching staffs, canteen staffs and all the stakeholder of university. This will surely ease our project be close to being successful, bring together members of university in one common platform and convey our major objective to greater spectrum.

Cleanliness Program: While focusing on cleanliness and maintenance of sanitation, it?s essential that we conduct cleanliness program and engage every member of university get used to our program.

Dustbin Set Up: We will set up separate dustbin for degradable (whose detail is explained in compost manure section) and non degradable wastes (which will be mainly send for recycling) at various mainly focusing on those areas where there is maximum flow of people. Through our regular study, we have already allocated the places.

TEM Bin- The main objective of our program is to set up TEM bins( in other word The Eco Minions Bins) where we will set up dustbins at dormitories. In TEM bin, we will collect unused papers, old books, notes, magazines. After thoroughly analyzing their conditions we will share those materials with needy students or sell them at minimum price or we will provide those materials to library and finally send them for recycling.

Compost Manure: Being agriculture students, it?s sort of necessities for us to know how we can make compost manure from degradable wastes. This covers our environmental science and Soil fertility parts of study. So by calling experts we will teach all students and both teaching and non teaching staffs of university and staffs of canteen about making compost manure while making them aware about its importance as well.

To put it in nutshell, with our SEW project we expect to enhance sanitary condition of university, engage members of different sectors of university into one common platform to work for betterment of university, fulfill our social and environmental responsibilities as university students, promote concept of 3Rs and sustainable development issues, preserve biodiversity and leave less carbon footprint.

I will keep updating about our project and its activities. Here is the video link of the SEW:

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkoUlSFlpYY

 I would like eco-generation members to suggest us some ideas by which we can make our project even better.