Chennai: Habitat for Humanity’s Terwilliger Center for Innovation has joined hands with Startup TN and Kerala Startup Mission for the launch of the M-Sand Innovation Challenge 2024.
Officially announced at a sector event in Chennai, the initiative aims to transform the landscape of affordable housing in India through the support and scaling of solutions that can increase supply and improve distribution channels of manufactured sand, or M-sand, as a sustainable and accessible alternative to river sand.
The initiative seeks to address challenges stemming from India’s construction boom, which in turn generated a skyrocketing demand for sand, one of the sector’s cornerstones. For instance, India is the world’s second-largest producer of cement, requiring huge amounts of sand.
This has fueled an illegal industry of river sand mining which, for years, have caused major environmental damage to the county’s rivers, according to a press release.
M-Sand is an eco-friendly alternative to conventional sand that is made from crushed granite. It has emerged as an alternative a construction material, with hopes to address the challenges of river sand mining, but also to help bridge the housing gap of almost 19 million units in urban areas. “Our goal is to collaborate with private sector actors to mainstream sustainable construction practices, with sights on bringing these practices to low-income markets, so that families can build homes that are more sustainable and resilient,” said Anoop Nambiar, India Country Director from Habitat’s Terwilliger Center.
