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Summer is here! Whereas some cities like Bangalore, the heart of India’s tech industry, is already grappling with a severe water crisis, some other cities like Pune are staring into evident water crisis in couple of months.
You might be hearing a lot about the different ways in which you can save water, starting from Community Initiatives like Water Metering, Rain water harvesting to initiatives in your own apartments/villas like use of aerators, etc. While we can all continue to do our part at home with water-saving techniques; in addition, there’s one simple act with an even bigger impact.
Make a Splash with Pre-Loved Books
With every pre-loved book you choose, you’re saving this precious water and more. As the academic year ends, don’t let those textbooks gather dust!
Why not arrange a Book Reuse drive in your Community – Your Own Book Fair! If you are in Bangalore, you can join the movement with our friends at Sumrux and participate in “Sumrux’s Eco Textbook Campaign.” Instead of tossing textbooks, give them a second life by sharing them with your community.
Here’s a surprising fact: water is hidden in everyday items, including your child’s textbooks! Did you know it takes a whopping 3,700 liters of water to produce just one kilogram of paper? That’s almost 1,000 gallons!
Engage the Kids in your Community
As it happens, most of the kids in your Community would be having vacations during this time of the year. This is a great initiative where you can involve the kids and even have them drive it end to end, under your supervision! Read on, for details on how you can run the initiative in your Community.
Here’s how you can create a Planet-Saving Book Exchange in Your Community:
Firstly, Assemble a Green Team: Gather a group of passionate volunteers who care about books and/or sustainability.
For Study Books
1. Drop & Pick-Up Point: Designate a convenient location for residents to drop off and pick up gently used textbooks.
2. Organize the Books: Encourage everyone to bundle textbooks neatly and label them with:
- Grade Level
- Board (e.g., CBSE, ICSE)
- School
- Year used
- Subjects covered
- Condition (Like new, gently used, etc.)
3. Volunteer Power: Volunteers can help label and sort books by grade for easy browsing.
4. Expanding the Reach: One or two volunteers can photograph the books and upload them to the Sumrux community pool, helping families outside your community access them (adding details takes about a minute or two per set!)
5. Request & Fulfillment: When someone in the community or outside requests a book through the Sumrux website, the coordinator can confirm availability, process the request online, and arrange a pick-up point within the community (e.g., with security at the gate).
Extra Benefits for RWAs:
Sumrux has partnered with Trash to Cash (trashtocash.co.in). Books that aren’t picked up can be sold for recycling, generating extra income for your Residents’ Welfare Association (RWA).
For Other Fiction/Non-Fiction Books
- You can have your Community members drop off other books they have at a certain drop point. Then you can bring them out and display them at a certain area, from where Community Residents can pick up the books of their choice and take them home.
- Or, you can designate a date when you can have a Reuse Book Fair. Residents can set up their own spaces where they give away their books or sell them to fellow residents at certain prices befitting the used books!
Make sure you have 2 separate drop areas for text books and other books, otherwise separating them later would take a lot of time.
The Impact of Your Participation:
By participating in this initiative, you make a great impact to the environment!
- Saving Water: Reused textbook saves thousands of liters of water.
- Saving Trees: Around 12-24 trees are needed to make just one ton of paper! Reusing textbooks translates directly to saving trees.
- Make Education Affordable: High-quality textbooks are expensive. By offering pre-loved alternatives, you’re making education more accessible.
- Promote Sustainability: This program teaches valuable lessons about responsible consumption and giving things a second chance.
Join the Movement!
Together, by reusing books, we can conserve precious water, save trees, and create a more sustainable future for Bangalore and beyond. If you are in Bangalore, connect with Sumrux to have the Eco textbook drop/pick up point set up in your community.
Fill up your name, contact, and community details here, or you can also message 9611398500.
Sumrux: Your One-Stop Sharing Hub
Sumrux powered by volunteers goes beyond textbooks to promote and facilitate responsible consumption to reduce your material footprint. Visit the website www.sumrux.com to know more explore other ways to save the planet while decluttering your home to take it a step further. Sumrux is your one-stop sharing hub for a more sustainable lifestyle!
This Blog is Co-Authored by Krupa TS
Once a techie, Krupa T S is a passionate advocate for sustainability. Her latest venture Sumrux a sharing hub aims to make preloved items the new cool in Bangalore. With a background in tech, she’s using innovation to make sustainable living accessible and stylish!