Please tell us about your journey?

It is important to realise — We clean our house to make the bigger house, the planet, unclean.

We are Ceiba Green Solutions, a waste management startup based in Bhubaneswar. We started in 2019 when I went on an expedition close to the North Pole, which was part of the 2041 Foundation. The expedition was based on raising awareness about climate change at the Polar regions . Here I witnessed lots of waste such as plastic bottles, cigarettes and fishing nets even in these higher regions. This had a tremendous impact on me and on return to Odisha, I became extremely sensitised to waste around me. That’s when I realised that if I wanted to do something about dealing with this waste, I had to be part of the solution. 

Then Covid struck and the intensity of operations could not be what we had planned. Also, since we were new, we were trying to navigate these waters. In the meanwhile, we kept the operations on the ground running through online workshops and training sessions. Then in 2021, I went to the UK to pursue a Masters, where my thesis was also on waste management. On my return, I completely focussed on the startup. 

What is the focus of your organisation?

The focus of Ceba is primarily wet waste management, single-use plastics organising, waste-free events and last but not least, raising awareness. Under wet waste management, we are focussing on providing composting services to bulk waste generators (such as hotels, restaurants, schools and colleges and even government institutions which generate canteen waste) as well as individual households. 

Yes, we put out the statistics on our website as we are planning to become more transparent as part of our initiative. Under the dry waste management, we launched the Recycle Pay app. We got a lot of traction because of it and acceptance in our base city Bhubaneswar. It’s an app where people can conveniently pick up a date, time and slot and request for waste pick up from their house and are also paid for the waste generated. This way, we are trying to incentivise people to micro-segregate their waste.

People not segregating their waste is actually life threatening, especially for the sanitary workers.

Under single-use plastic waste management, we have an e-commerce platform, where we have curated various products from various vendors — and all are single-use plastic-free. This is our way of providing alternatives and really helpful in people reducing their consumption for the same. 

Further, we are raising awareness through our work with many institutes, especially educational. 

As far as waste-free events go, we want to do much more but haven’t yet found the scope in Bhubaneswar. We look forward to work with event managers who conduct large scale events. 

What is your vision and expansion plan?

Our vision is to reduce the volume of waste that goes to the landfills and thus curb GHE emissions, we want to contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and make more local impact as much as possible. We want to scale to other cities, especially Odisha and Eastern India.  We are mostly looking at Tier 11 cities. Instead of spreading out too much, we would prefer to make a deeper impact in fewer locations. There are other players and competitors in other cities who are working towards this waste issue. We all have to grow together and we look forward to collaborating with them.

What advise would you like to give to individuals wanting to start their green business?

Firstly, not everyone needs to become an entrepreneur if they want to take climate action. You can do it by being part of various groups who are concerned about climate change. You could even do your bit as an individual to fulfil your responsibility towards the environment by taking action.

But if you are looking forward to starting your venture, it’s a must to study and understand the sector in which you are working very closely. Finding a good mentor at the initial stages is also crucial. This is because you might have a good understanding of the technology, but maybe not of the business. Moreover, be a part of incubators and various eco systems that support channelising your energy.

Any lessons learnt during your journey that you would like to share with us?

I was very lucky to get guidance and support from my husband who is a first-generation entrepreneur. It’s most important to have a sound business model. You might be very passionate about something, but once you are running a business, it is indispensable that you make money for the business to be sustainable. Importantly, be honest with what you are doing. And since it is a green business, you have to be true to the environment and the citizens. You can’t ‘greenwash’.

How has being a green entrepreneur impacted your personal values? 

I think it’s been the vice versa in my case. My love for the outdoors has come into bringing this business to life. I want to reach more and more people because the more we spread, the more the environment will benefit. Finally, we all will live better lives.
Do you think the time for green businesses is here?

Yes. Green entrepreneurship is rising and I say that there are five basic areas which will see a boom – manufacturing, our eating habits (how we grow and ), how we travel, how we plug in (energy efficiency) and overall, how we live.

For businesses to positively impact the environment, they need to realise their bit. For example, if it is a mining company, they have to have a certain kind of environmental mandate. Even in the case of software companies, they need to realise their responsibilities in the form of maybe CSR.

People are becoming more aware and I always say that we may not need smart cities, but we definitely need smarter citizens. That’s how we can help smartly impact the environment.