Our Initiatives
CLOTH FOR WORK (CFW)
Worldwide when we think of resources for any kind of development work, we think of money. Goonj works on turning old material as a resource for hundreds of rural development activities.
Communities have built huge bamboo bridges, dug up wells, have done bunding of acres of land, developed small irrigation canals, have built drainage systems, built village schools and have taken up massive exercises of repairing roads, developing water harvesting systems to cleaning up water bodies. All these works are done but by making people understand their own community power and giving old usable old material as a reward.
SCHOOL TO SCHOOL
Goonj’s award winning School to School initiative is addressing the educational needs of thousands of remote & resource starved village/ slum schools by channelizing under-utilised material of city’s affluent schools not as a thing to distribute but as a tool to bring about comprehensive behaviour change in the recipients and the contributors!
Scores of children leave schools for unimaginably reasons like lack of note book, pencil, water bottle or inability of parents to pay the recurring expense of stationery, which are abundance in urban schools.
NOT JUST A PIECE OF CLOTH
Almost a decade ago we were shocked when we came across this ghastly story of a woman who died of tetanus due to a rusted hook in the piece of blouse she used during menses !! At that time we had no idea about the deep rooted relationship between cloth and menstruation. This story fueled us to go deeper into the non issue..
It is seen that in the absence of a clean piece of cloth, millions of women in villages and city slums use rags, sand, ash, etc. to deal with their menses..
A humble piece of cotton cloth can save a woman from a lot of indignity, embarrassment and infections.
RAHAT
For nearly 2 two decades, Goonj has been working on varied disasters from earthquakes to Tsunami, cyclones, floods, etc. Rahat as an initiative has evolved into an active, reliable and time-tested network of stakeholders in both rural & urban India ensuring our timely response for generating need based disaster relief & rehabilitation efforts.
We educate common masses about sensitivities of giving, creating a culture of mindful giving.
Goonj also strives to bring attention to preventable disasters like winter to reduce deaths and suffering in this season primarily due to non-availability of clothing.
GREEN BY GOONJ
‘Green by Goonj’ a brand built around reusing and up-cycling even the last shreds of material that Goonj receives. A range of over 100 different products like purses, fancy bags, file folder, mats etc. made out of torn jeans, obsolete audio tapes, one side used paper etc. shows the ingenuity, craftsmanship and design aesthetics of women from nearby slums involved in making these products. Buying a ‘Green by Goonj’ products ensures that our work in rural India continues unhindered irrespective of large/small funding support.
Societal Alliance for Resilience and Response to Disasters (SARRD)
SARRD is an alliance initiated by Goonj to set up a formal cross-sectoral alliance of entities with pre-committed resources to positively impact the disaster response ecosystem and understanding. This solution is unique and first-of-its-kind globally, to bring together diverse entities involved, and those who must be involved, to create a transformative impact. Through this alliance, we hope to achieve a more comprehensive, coordinated, and collaborative bottoms-up approach to rapid and sustained disaster mitigation, relief, and rehabilitation.
GOONJ FELLOWSHIPS
Our Fellowship journey started recently, in 2018, with the first cohort of ‘Urban Fellowship’. The ‘Grassroots Fellowship’ started in 2019 while the ‘Sanjha Fellowship’ and ‘Next Generation Fellowship’ were launched in 2020. Each of these one-year fellowships fills a gap we noticed in the larger ecosystem.
