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Decoding Impact of Capacity building programs and Competitions – Case of Circular Economy Challenge 2020

Lifelong learning can be defined as a combination of all the knowledge, skills and values learnt throughout one’s life in all settings (life-wide) and this can be achieved through the various formal, informal, and non-formal modes of learning. Ekonnect Knowledge Foundation has been conducting various capacity-building programs and events on environmental management and sustainability for […]

THE 25 YEARS

This January my consulting company Environmental Management Centre Pvt. Ltd. completed 25 years! I am writing this post today to share my experience in this journey. This story telling may help young entrepreneurs entering the profession of environmental management. I left my full-time teaching position at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay to establish EMC. […]

SHOULD WE STOP THE ENVIRONMENTAL CLEARANCE PROCESS?

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) has been a celebrated tool, widely accepted across the world for sustainable development following a precautionary principle. But in its 50 years of existence, effectiveness of EIA has remained in question. Some believe that requirement of EIA has influenced the project concept, its siting, design and operations and they have few […]

HAVE YOU HEARD ABOUT ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT 4.0?

Sure, my Professor Friend was not in a good mood yesterday. For strange reasons, only known to him, he was aggressive with me asking questions that I was not comfortable to answer. Our coffee conversations began with a question. “Dr Modak, have you heard about Environmental Impact Assessment 4.0?” “No Professor”. I responded. I could […]

Selling Biodiversity on the occasion of the World Environment Day

The Finance Minister (FM) called my Professor Friend last week to come up with a solution to raise funds to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic. The FM also asked how can the private sector be increasingly involved, and be part of the solution and take more responsibilities rather than keep demanding packages that were impossible to […]

Have you heard about Environmental Impact Assessment 4.0?

Sure, my Professor Friend was not in a good mood yesterday. For strange reasons, only known to him, he was aggressive with me asking questions that I was not comfortable to answer. Our coffee conversations began with a question. “Dr Modak, have you heard about Environmental Impact Assessment 4.0?” “No Professor”. I responded. I could […]

Ikigai, Business and Sustainability

Few weeks ago, I met a senior executive of a large corporate in Ahmadabad for a discussion. This corporate wanted to strengthen their Environmental Social Management System (ESMS) and Governance (ESG). The Executive must be one of the IIM graduates I guess – as he spoke to me with an authority despite no great knowledge […]

Should we set up a National Environmental Monitoring Organization?

With the advances in monitoring devices especially drones, remote sensed imageries and sensors, internet of things (ioT) and apps on mobile phones, the amount of data in the world is growing exponentially. By 2020, Cisco estimates there will 40 zettabytes of data in existence. Some of this data will be raw, unstructured, which may be […]

Is It Worth Recycling?

It was a Sunday morning. We were sitting in my Professor friends study. I was enjoying my coffee. Professor lit his cigar and said “Dr Modak, I feel that today benefits of waste recycling are simply overrated. We should stop much of the kind of recycling we do and I mean it” I was shocked […]