Incubator for environmental change

Gwendoline and Azain Raban, an Australian-Sri Lankan couple based in Melbourne, decided to step up to the environmental and sustainable challenges in their local community. Their contribution is simple: pairing up people with innovative ideas, but without the resources, knowledge and network to implement them, with experienced and well-connected professionals, who can help bring them into fruition.

The couple, who have a background in these fields, launched the Sustainable Impact Mentoring Programme after attending the 2016 Caux Dialogue on Land and Security, part of the Caux Forum which takes place every summer in Caux, Switzerland.

‘Caux really provides a unique experience,’ Gwendoline explained to us during an interview. ‘There is an atmosphere of trust, dialogue, sharing and community, which is beneficial for anyone who attends.’ They were particularly inspired by the Emerging Leaders Programme, a mentoring element of the Caux Dialogue on Land and Security.

The four-month mentoring programme Gwendoline and Azain have helped establish and run at Initiatives of Change Australia, is all about exchanging stories and experiences, as happens in Caux. Six participants have been selected after a competitive process, in which each presented their own idea.

The ideas being incubated include transforming solar energy technologies, creating collaborative spaces to link sustainable businesses, encouraging people to stop using plastic bags, raising awareness through the arts, developing a means of electronically mapping the underground sewerage system in Victoria, Australia to make maintenance more sustainable and reduce environmental pollution from leakages, and alerting the younger generation to their responsibility for small-scale environmental change.

People may have an idea, but they don’t know how to develop it into a project - Azain Raban

‘We want to empower individuals, who have good ideas and want to create positive impact, but still do not have the means of doing it by themselves and are in need of advice from experienced professionals,’ said Azain.

Through a series of workshops and one-to-one mentoring sessions, participants are helped to consolidate their ideas as part of a collective effort which includes stakeholders and beneficiaries. Gwendoline pointed out that project design is ‘about looking at what end-users need and not about what you think what people may need’.

‘Our vision is to grow this programme in Australia and expand it to Asia Pacific,’ added Azain. They also want to inspire others to create similar platforms in their own countries. ‘Since Initiatives of Change is all about being a changemaker,’ said Gwendoline, ‘maybe the impact will grow and we will meet people in Caux who want to apply it somewhere else in the world. It’s all about exchanging ideas, learnings and visions. You never know what can happen just by people coming together with some ideas.’

The proponents of the best developed ideas within the Sustainable Impact Mentoring Programme will participate in this summer’s Caux Dialogue on Land and Security from 11 to 15 July.

To learn more about this and other events taking place during the Caux Forum this year, visit www.caux.ch