Why Green Parenting is not optional
On the eve of Earth Day (April 22), ParentsWorld interviewed environment experts and parents who have taken the lead in teaching children to Go Green from infancy – K.P. Malini When Rajesh Shah returned from the US to India in 2007 with his family comprising wife Vallari, a mediator, gardener and dancer, and two children Parthiv and Tarang to live in Bangalore, a nature-friendly lifestyle was top of his agenda. An electronics engineer and water conservationist, Shah and his wife constructed Laughing Waters Eco Home, an environment-friendly home in Whitefield, Bangalore. “We were early adopters of sustainable living in our new city. Our home is 99 percent solar-powered with 90 percent of our vegetables needs sourced from our own garden nurtured with home-made compost. We are a 99 percent chemicals-free family with even our household cleaning materials being free of chemicals. And contrary to popular belief, leading a sustainable lifestyle is an inexpensive proposition,” says Vallari. A compelling reason for the couple to Go Green was the desire to raise their children in an eco-friendly environment. “We wanted our children to reconnect with nature and help us in reducing our carbon footprint. Therefore, we all resolved to follow an alternative sustainable lifestyle. For instance, my children cycle or take the bus to school and carry water in non-plastic bottles,” says Shah. Gradually, there is dawning awareness around the world that Planet Earth is staring at an unprecedented environmental crisis. Global warming, climate change, destruction of natural habitats of wildlife and plants, air and water pollution, rising sea water levels due to meltdown of polar ice caps, are chipping away at our environment and threatening mankind, and children in particular. Around the world there’s rising awareness among governments, education institutions and households that the impending environmental disaster needs immediate attention and lifestyles changes. The US-based Earth Day Network (EDN, estb. 1995), which coordinates annual Earth Day (April 22) celebrations worldwide, has announced that its focus this year will be on “ending plastics pollution”, which is choking rivers, lakes and oceans and degrading soils around the world. Therefore, EDN has initiated a global movement to regulate the disposal of single-use plastics, promote alternatives to fossil fuel-based packaging materials and 100 percent recycling of plastics, through “corporate and government accountability and changing human behaviour”. Obviously, this initiative can’t be a one-off event; it has to be sustained for several generations. That’s why EDN leaders accord great importance to environment education and adoption of sustainable lifestyles from children’s earliest years. Leaders of the global Go Green movement which is swelling into a tidal wave, firmly believe that if Planet Earth is to be saved from the reckless despoliation and depredations of mankind, environment awareness and education of the next generation must begin at home from early age. Dr. Shyna Prasanth, a veterinary surgeon with the Kerala Government Health Services, tends a vegetable garden at her home in Nadapuram, North Kerala, which she maintains together with her two children. “I enrich the vegetable garden with slurry from my biogas…
