Skill Development in Temple Flower Waste Recycling for Incense Stick and Cone Entrepreneurship
Project Overview
A two-day skill development workshop organised by Eco Awaken Foundation (Ek Aarambh) in collaboration with GNDU-GJCEI, Pushap Punya, FICCI FLO Amritsar, and the Post Graduate Department of Zoology, Khalsa College Amritsar, with support from EIACP Punjab, Punjab State Council for Science & Technology (PSCST), and the Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change, Government of India. The project aims to empower unemployed women through hands-on training in recycling temple flower waste into incense sticks and cones, promoting waste-to-wealth, sustainable livelihoods, women entrepreneurship, and environmental sustainability.
Project Details
Eco Awaken Foundation, Amritsar, organised a two-day skill development workshop titled “Empowering Unemployed Women: Skill Development in Temple Flower Waste Recycling for Incense Stick and Cone Entrepreneurship” on 28–29 October 2024 at Jathu Nangal Village, Majitha, Amritsar, Punjab. The initiative engaged more than 50 rural women, who received hands-on training in manufacturing incense sticks and cones using recycled temple flower waste. The training covered floral waste collection, segregation, drying, grinding, raw material preparation, formulation, shaping and packaging, equipping participants with practical skills to convert discarded flowers into value-added products. The programme aimed to promote sustainable waste management, resource recovery, pollution prevention, circular economy practices and green entrepreneurship while creating opportunities for women’s self-employment, livelihood generation and micro-enterprise development. The workshop was organised in collaboration with Guru Nanak Dev University–GJCEI, Pushap Punya, FICCI FLO Amritsar, and the Post Graduate Department of Zoology, Khalsa College, Amritsar. It was supported by the Environmental Information, Awareness, Capacity Building and Livelihood Programme (EIACP), Punjab; the Punjab State Council for Science & Technology (PSCST), Chandigarh; and the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC), Government of India. By integrating practical manufacturing training with environmental awareness and entrepreneurship development, the project promoted a community-based waste-to-wealth model linking temple flower waste recycling with rural women’s empowerment, sustainable livelihoods and environmental protection.
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