Recycled India – Reuse, Reduce , Recycle

Do you know that more than a million tires across the globe are dumped in landfills and water streams? It takes around 800 years for a tyre to decompose and discarded tires are act as the main source for breeding of mosquitoes and other disease carrying insects. This is because the tires are made of rubber and are hollow with grooving traps water for a long time. With no easy disposal options, discarded tires are burnt openly leaving deadly and dangerous smoke which contains toxic compounds. Discarded tires are also thrown in landfills, their hollow and round shape takes up valuable land space, and tires just don’t stay buried in the ground, they release methane and ripping through landfill liners through the process.

Realizing this toxic, Prashant Lingam & Aruna Kappagantula initiated a social venture – Recycled India to address the grave issue of discarded tires and drums which at present are not being recycled in our country and most of the scrap is either dumped or thrown along with open garbage and burnt.

Recycled India, at present aims at making furniture out of scrap tires, drums, footwear out of tires, bus shelters out of empty pet bottles, low cost houses with discarded pet bottles, speakers out of tires, lighting systems with tires, furniture with cardboard waste, sofa sets with pet bottles and a whole lot of things. In short, if there is anything that can be recycled, this startup has a unique product out of it.

The birth of the social Venture

The team of Startup Hyderabad got a chance to get in touch with the proud duo team of this startup. When we asked them how the idea generated, this is what they had to say –

“We recently came across an incident where we saw tires being burnt openly and when inquired, the owner said he had no other solution to discard scrap tires hence the idea of utilizing scrap tires for making furniture and other value added products originated. Being a social enterprise ALREADY working in bamboo, we decided to take up another challenge of addressing tire scrap.”

After the birth of the idea, It took the duo almost 2 years for R & D , as they had no one to guide or mentor them and no one had any idea about furniture making with tires, drums and footwear. They had their own share of struggles but today they are very happy that it has been very well received.

The startup has piloted their startup with their partnership with GHMC in various parks and public places. They collect public feedback and would improve accordingly, they are also working to Pilot pet bottle bus shelters at various locations in the city.

The team

Prashant Lingam & Aruna Kappagantula are the co-founders, who also happen to be married to each other. Apart from the husband wife duo, the startup has a 15 member team at the shop floor. This is their second social venture , the first venture being bamboo house india, which works in providing livelihoods to rural and tribal communities working in the bamboo sector and provides low cost bamboo shelter solutions and through their bamboo initiative they impact around 50000 livelihoods across the country

Future Plans

The team aims at developing tire planters and set up the same in all median across the city of Hyderabad and replace cemented pots, create seating spaces in parks and public spaces with recycled items, set up recycled bus shelters, create employment in the unorganized sector and build green livelihoods and make statement through the work that scrap is the next cool thing. They also have plans to develop recycled zones across all the educational institutions across the city.

Kudos team – this social venture is actually addressing a big environmental issue of the society, which otherwise is ignored. All the best for all your future endeavors. Stay tuned to read about their first social venture – BambooHouseIndia.

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