Kerala’s capital city Thiruvananthapuram was recognised and awarded at the International Zero Waste Conference held in Malaysia, which saw participation from eight countries. 

In a ceremony held on October 14 in Malaysia’s Penang, Thiruvananthapuram was recognised from among the other participants which included Indonesia, Philippines, Malaysia and others. K Sreekumar, Chairman of the Municipal Health Standing Committee will receive the award on behalf of the Thiruvananthapuram corporation at the awards ceremony in Penang.

The International Zero Waste Cities is a group of cities across the Asia-Pacific region that implement a zero waste disposal project in their countries. The international group of cities implement plastic waste reduction initiatives, sort and collect urban waste at the source, promote decentralised treatment, and recycling among other initiatives.

Apart from Thiruvananthapuram, Chennai is the other Indian city which is considered a ZeroWaste city and is part of the International Zero Waste group. 

The group has been selected for the purpose of Brand Auditing of Plastic Waste, Seaside Plastic Waste Study, Zero Waste Activities in Schools, Green Protocol and Source-Decentralised Waste Management. It is led by Gaya Asia Pacific, which promotes and propagates ZeroWest ideas. 

More than eight hundred organisations from more than ninety countries are members of this group. The Gaya Asia Pacific, which includes organisations from Asian and South East Asian countries, is headquartered in the Philippines.