Building Climate-Ready Cities: The Role of EcoSattva in Leading Ecological Restoration and Solid Waste Management

Natasha Zarine, a YIF ’13 alum from Ashoka University, is the co-founder and Managing Director of The Center for Applied Research and People’s Engagement (CARPE) and EcoSattva Environmental Solutions. With a background in Liberal Arts and Sciences from the Young India Fellowship at Ashoka University and UPenn, she brings a strong foundation to her work as an entrepreneur in the socio-environmental and climate sectors, as well as the waste management industry.

About EcoSattva

CARPE and EcoSattva focus on building inclusive and sustainable communities by delivering evidence-based, partnership-driven solutions to pressing civic challenges. Their primary focus areas include water body restoration, green cover management, and solid waste management—all aligned with their vision for a sustainable world.

Through their projects, they have undertaken efforts such as cleaning rivers and other water bodies, establishing eco-friendly sewage treatment projects, and offering sustainable solutions for green cover and waste management.

In our interview, Natasha shared insights about her featured projects, EcoSattva’s mission, and future plans.

Tell us about your Feature Project and the WRI Ross Center Prize for Cities and St. Andrews Prize for The Environment. 

About Kham River Restoration Mission

The Kham River Restoration Mission represents a pioneering effort in collaborative environmental stewardship, driven by Chhatrapati Sambhaji Nagar Municipal Corporation, Varroc Industries, Cantonment Board, and EcoSattva Environmental Solutions. The programme harnesses local expertise and management capabilities to adopt a comprehensive approach, integrating ecological restoration, city-wide waste management, and extensive community engagement.

The project’s ecological restoration efforts focus on critical areas such as bank stabilisation, dredging, and the creation of a 5km EcoPark, featuring wetlands and recreational spaces reclaimed from former waste sites. The programme harnesses municipal resources already deployed, to tackle these matters. Waste management strategies target Garbage Vulnerable Points, transforming them into community-oriented spaces with native plantings and community artwork. The programme also enables the implementation of the BOTRAM App, developed by EcoSattva, facilitating real-time monitoring and data-driven decision-making to enhance operational efficiency and transparency.

Training initiatives have equipped sanitation staff across 42 wards with enhanced waste collection and material recovery skills while establishing three new material recovery sites that provide dignified work environments and professional development opportunities for waste pickers, predominantly women. This initiative has fostered social integration and improved waste segregation behaviour among residents.

Education and cultural revitalisation campaigns are integral to the project, engaging schools, cultural programmes, and local artwork to instil a renewed sense of civic pride and understanding of the Kham River’s ecological importance. The programme’s inclusion in the River Cities Alliance and recognition by the National Institute of Urban Affairs highlight its influence on regional watershed management and urban planning strategies for seasonal rivers nationwide.

Continued stakeholder engagement, robust monitoring practices, and community-driven initiatives position the Kham River Restoration Project as a sustainable model for integrated urban river management, demonstrating significant progress towards environmental resilience and community well-being.

WRI Ross Center Prize for Cities

The Kham River Restoration Mission was recognised by the WRI Ross Center for Sustainable Cities as part of their Ross Prize for Cities. EcoSattva received the prize on behalf of the project during New York Climate Week and the United Nations General Assembly in New York City on 25th September 2024. The project and the city were represented to a global audience. On behalf of the project, EcoSattva followed and completed the detailed and rigorous application and selection process, which included multiple application forms, presentations, and collaborative efforts by all partners during field visits to present the work to the assessors.

CSN (Aurangabad), along with the four other finalists and prize winners—Oslo, New York, Buenos Aires, and Fortaleza—showcased their models for urban transformation at the Yale Hixon Center for Urban Sustainability, with the event broadcast online to an international audience. These five cities were selected from a total of 200 applicants representing 148 cities across 62 countries. Yale has also recorded the presentations and plans to publish the Kham River’s journey and impact as a case study, allowing experts and scholars from its academic community to learn from it and share insights with future environment and climate professionals.

Since the announcement in May 2024, WRI has released a video and published an article, in both English and Hindi, about the Kham River Restoration Mission on their global platforms, highlighting the city and district’s work. 

St. Andrews Prize for The Environment

The Kham River Restoration Mission has been selected as one of the three finalists for the 2024 St Andrews Prize for the Environment. This global recognition honours our groundbreaking work in climate-resilient riverfront development, pollution prevention, waste recovery, and our emphasis on fostering community participation and social inclusion.

EcoSattva Environmental Solutions applied for the Prize for Cities in April 2024. The University of St Andrews shortlisted the project among the top three finalists from 125 submissions spanning the globe.

The University of St Andrews established the highly renowned St Andrews Prize for the Environment in 1998. This prize recognises innovative approaches to environmental and climate-related problems.

2. What’s next at EcoSattva?

As we expand our wetlands restoration solutions along the entire length of the Kham River and a neighbouring river, as well as lakes and ponds, we are building our app that standardises this process for training other district governments and organisations. This is part of the scale-out plan. We have also been appointed by the State Climate Action Cell to use this process to build out a District Climate Action Plan anchored in wetlands, which will then be used for the rest of the districts. The idea is that we need to restore our wetlands to build in climate resilience, whether we look at flood risk readiness, drought risk readiness, sustainable agriculture, effective solid and liquid waste management, policy and governance. So, in a way, when we attempt to restore our wetlands, what we’re really doing is, restoring our districts and readying them for the climate uncertainties ahead, while impacting health and environmental conditions in the present. 

3. What’s your call to action?

We need to direct our attention to seasonal wetlands—they are ubiquitous and are the key to helping us prepare for the climate uncertainties ahead. As discussed, we are forced to fix our broken essential services systems and fill governance and policy gaps if we focus on restoring wetlands. It’s not just an ecological approach, but one keeping people at the centre. 

Therefore, our call to action is: we need the government to apply its schemes such as Start-up India, Make in India, PMKVY, etc., in an action-based and directed form, so that we are tackling the challenges around wetlands restoration, while also creating green jobs, enabling local start-ups to deliver the services needed and actually achieving the SBM, MVA and SDG goals, rather than just paying lip service. 

For every ton of plastic recovered, we can create 10 jobs, for every acre greened, we create 2 jobs, for every km of wetland restored, we create 10 jobs. 

The savings in terms of prevention of disasters/health impact, etc would be immense as well. 

4. How can Ashoka & your organisation work more closely?

• Through internships and placements. 
• Through partnerships for scale: we are happy to train budding entrepreneurs in our process if the University is keen to develop this partnership with the Maharashtra state govt. 
• Research and publication: We have always taken on a data-driven approach, especially since my time at YIF and how data and impact were underscored during the course. However, we are so entrenched in implementation, that publication takes a backseat. So we would like to build a partnership to publish papers from real data from the field.