Reap Benefit and Me

By Vibish Kashyap

I am Vibish Kashyap from TVSA, Hosur. Our school was always concerned about the environment and it made sure that no students were causing harm to the environment and that they were going green. We were told that we would be working with Reap Benefit which would conduct workshops for us. To be honest, the first time we all thought that it would be a boring workshop where we would be always reading and writing something. When they came here, they broke all our assumptions and proved that it was a complete fun-filled workshop and a beneficial one too. They were not only teaching us how to go green but made us understand how to improve our knowledge, relationships, and behavior while we were improving the environment. I personally realized that creating awareness of what is happening to the environment was not the only solution, but doing something that lasts long and at least has a small impact on the environment was an option too. We thought that we should do something effective.

First, we started repairing all the aerators on our campus which had been installed by our seniors. We collected data and had a clear vision of how there had been increased in water conservation by these aerators. As a part of waste management, we brought in the system of transparent dustbins in our school. We thought that transparent dustbins with labels can differentiate wet waste and dry waste as people can drop waste accordingly. We implemented drip irrigation on a small scale in the garden. Recently, we made a drip irrigation system on a large scale and also a greywater system in our school. We soon replicated these solutions in a government school at Hosur.

When we had just completed the small-scale drip irrigation and were about to start greywater harvesting, within three weeks, I got a chance to act for Unilever’s ‘Project Sunlight’ too. I had to prepare an emotional speech about water hygiene and how it had affected people. I used all the knowledge that I obtained from my Reap Benefit workshops to make my speech. I also spoke about solutions for water hygiene like the bio-sand water filter of which I learned from my Reap Benefit session. I went to Pune for my shooting and from there I was taken to a village called Saswad where I gave my speech to the villagers near the polluted lake of Saswad. I hope that, when this advertisement gets released, people will have a clear view of how water hygiene has a huge impact on us. I also feel that I have done something on a large scale though it is only awareness. I should definitely thank Reap Benefit for referring me and letting me do something which will have a huge impact. I wish my journey with Reap Benefit always continues.

To know more about Reap Benefit, check out www.reapbenefit.org.