India is projected to be the fastest-growing bioenergy market in the world between 2023 and 2030, accounting for 35 per cent of the global demand (Moorhouse and Báscones 2025). India has already set several blending targets—like 5 per cent compressed biogas blending requirement by 2028–29, 7 per cent of biomass cofiring in power plants by 2026, 20 per cent ethanol by 2025–26 and 5 per cent biodies...

Indian rice straw residues can be made into profitable resources with the required infrastructure investments.Agricultural waste burning is one of the world largest sources of seasonal air pollution. In India’s Punjab province, 15.4 million tonnes of rice straw are burnt after each crop harvest. Globally around 450 million tonnes of crop residues are burnt each year resulting in 1.2 million tonnes...

Stubble burning has met its answer, and it’s microbial. A cocktail of seven fungi developed by scientists from the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) in New Delhi provide a welcome alternative to the stubble burning that happens every year after harvest. Farmers burn the leftover stacks to clear the soil and fight pests and weeds, but the practice can contribute up to 40% of local pollu...

ASEAN Member States (AMS) encourage to adopt sustainable agricultural practices that preserve soil health and enhance long-term food security. Comprising a comprehensive strategy for AMS, the ASEAN Guidelines on Crop Burning Reduction can serve as a guidance document for sustainable agricultural practices that offer a clear path forward for achieving a carbon neutral future.The ASEAN Guidelines em...

Rapid economic progress in Viet Nam has been accompanied by a huge increase in consumption and, as a result, waste – particularly plastic waste. It is estimated that Viet Nam’s post-consumer plastic waste will rise by 36% from 2018 levels by the year 2030.1 Despite major commitments from the government, business and civil society, plastic waste leakage into the country’s water bodies is expected t...

This Handbook is for organizations who are currently working with, or plan to work with, women entrepreneurs to produce or support the design of household energy technologies, or who will engage women as sales agents or entrepreneurs in rural or urban locations to market, distribute, and/or provide after-sales service of household energy technologies. The Empowered Entrepreneur Training Handbook p...

The Best Practices for Solid Waste Management: A Guide for Decision-Makers in Developing Countries (Guide) is focused on best practices for solid waste management in medium and large urban centers in developing countries (generally referred to as “cities” in the Guide), because they face the most substantial solid waste management challenges.Given their waste generation projections, these challeng...

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) released the report Gender and waste nexus: Experiences from Bhutan, Mongolia and Nepal, co-authored by GRID-Arendal, at the 8th ISWA World Congress in Bilbao, Spain. The Gender and waste nexus report provides a detailed analysis of the gendered nature of the waste sector in these countries.The report is one of the products of the Waste and Climate C...

How to finance the 2030 Agenda at the country level has emerged as a key issue since world leaders adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in September 2015. Governments’ abilities to mobilize, sequence and make effective use of a wide variety of both financing sources and financing instruments and strategies will be central to their ability to achieve the ambitious new sustainable develo...

The Wastewise Cities (WaCT) Data Portal is the data portal for UN-Habitat’s Waste Wise Cities initiative: it gathers standardized municipal solid waste (MSW) data from cities that have used the Waste Wise Cities Tool (WaCT). Specifically, it reports on quantities of waste generated, collected, and — crucially — how much of that waste is managed in controlled facilities (a key part of the SDG 11.6....