Khosla Ashok
Organization: Development Alternatives
Year Founded: 1983
Country: India
Website: www.devalt.org
Development Alternatives’ innovative technologies or methodologies always combine two goals: to create income for the poor and to regenerate the environment. Focus: Climate Change, Energy, Environment, Literacy, Sustainable and Rural Development, Technology, Water, Youth Geographic Area of Impact: India Model: Hybrid Non-Profit Recognition: Schwab Fellow of the World Economic Forum Background In India, half of the rural population is unemployed, underemployed or informally employed. This population needs income-generating jobs that provide them with economic security and with the products and services required to satisfy their basic needs. At the same time, the industries that create these jobs must reduce their wasteful use of energy, water, forests and other natural resources. Conventional development practices only increase the gap between the haves and the have-nots. New technologies and institutional systems are needed to achieve equitable and environmentally sound development. Innovation and Activities The strategy of Development Alternatives is to develop and deliver alternative technologies that are commercially viable and environmentally friendly. Among its successes are machines that produce standardized and affordable products for rural markets, such as roofing systems, compressed earth blocks, fired bricks, recycled paper, handloom textiles, cooking stoves, briquette presses and biomass-based electricity. Its simple but highly effective TARA micro-concrete roof tile kit, for example, provides employment for five people, while the TARA vertical shaft brick kiln reduces energy use by 55% and emissions by 50%. Development Alternatives’ paper production units employ 40 workers to produce textured, high-quality paper out of rags and recycled paper for use in stationery, cards and commercial products. DESI Power, the electric utility of Development Alternatives, installs mini power stations in villages, fuelled by weeds and agricultural wastes. TARAhaat, the ICT affiliate of Development Alternatives brings information technology to villages through its portal (www.TARAhaat.com) and its rapidly growing network of over 400 franchised local telecentres, which provide a wide range of information services including educational courses, e-governance services and Internet connectivity to local people on a commercial basis. The Lifelines Project it is implementing in rural India uses mobile telephone technology to connect poor farmers across 1,000 villages to critical agricultural information though volunteers. Its functional Hindi literacy programme has made more than 50,000 rural women literate in less than 18 months. Local groups and official agencies use Development Alternatives’ portable pollution monitoring kits to test water and air quality in cities and towns across India. The Entrepreneur Ashok Khosla holds a PhD in Experimental Physics from Harvard University. He abandoned a promising scientific career to focus on issues of environment and development. After helping to design and teach Harvard’s first course on the environment, he set up and directed the environmental policy unit for the government of India. Subsequently, he worked for the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) in Kenya before starting Development Alternatives in 1983. Khosla has been a board member of many global environmental institutions, including the Club of Rome, IUCN, WWF, IISD, SEI and the Alliance for a New Humanity. He is also an advisor to UNEP, UNDP and the World Bank. In 2002, Khosla received the United Nations Sasakawa Environment Prize, and in 2008 received an Order of the British Empire by Her Majesty, the Queen of England. In 2009, he was elected president of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
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