Inspiring Climate Action Since 2009
Amruta Kshemkalyani, an expert sustainability professional turned social entrepreneur, is the founder of the Sustainability Tribe, AK Sustainability Advisory, and #ZeroWasteUAE social initiative. She is been helping businesses with sustainable transformation for more than 14 years. Amruta is a well-known figure in the region as well as internationally for her subject expertise as well as contribution to changing mindsets and behavior through sustainability education for the last 12 years, and creating an urban grassroots movement for sustainable change by building her ‘Sustainability Tribe’!
Amruta founded this sustainability-focused media back in 2009 with a mission of raising social awareness by sharing her expertise and personal journey of sustainable lifestyle. She strongly believes in practicing what you preach. Amruta and her family are living sustainably since 2008 and zero waste since 2016, she shares her tried and tested tips, attainable region-specific sustainability hacks, and guidelines; to inspire her tribe to take climate action.
After leaving her corporate job in 2019, she converted Sustainability Tribe (which was a pioneering sustainability focused media) into a social enterprise combining her sustainability expertise and her passion for raising sustainability awareness. She launched many social initiatives and programs including free Community Events for public to learn, act & engage with us, Ambassador Program a reward based digital education program for members of public, an affordable Sustainability Education Program giving everyone access to quality education in the form of e-books and online courses. Plus Sustainability Tribe Club Membership for businesses and individuals that have started or yet to start their sustainability journey and want to form long term partnership with us. Organizations, brands and businesses can support Amruta’s work and her Sustainability Tribe’s social programs either by sponsorship or partnership or by becoming Club members and contribute to local action as well as improving their community engagement.
Paralelly, she also founded her own sustainability consulting business, AK Sustainability Advisory that helps businesses with their internal ESG and sustainability commitments including strategy
With the mission of bridging the gap between various industry sectors and authentic social-environmental sustainability, she offers some innovative, out of the box, creative as well as bespoke solutions to bring a positive impact and sustainable change.
Sustainability Coach & Speaker
With years of experience of training executives, professionals, teams for sustainability as well as mentoring juniors, early start-ups, and students; Amruta brings a unique perspective to the topics of sustainable development, climate action, and circular economy and is a popular speaker.
Amruta is known as a ‘motivational speaker for climate action‘ because of her in-depth knowledge and ability to inspire. She regularly gets invited to speak at international conferences as well as delivering sustainability-focused seminars, workshops across educational institutes, corporates, and public events.
Impacts created by Amruta’s work and Sustainability Tribe have earned recognition locally as well as internationally over the last 12 years.
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Amruta is originally a Mechanical Engineer, later qualified as LEED Accredited Professional, Estidama PQP as well as certified in Business Sustainability Management at Cambridge Institute of Sustainability Leadership. Her primary specialization is in sustainable design and built environment along with sustainability project management. She has shared her story of working in a male-dominated field on the occasion of International Women in Engineering Day. You can find her client and project portfolio here. She is one of the first certified sustainability consultants in the UAE and is active in the industry since 2008. Over the years, she helped organizations from varied industries, polishing her business sustainability skills. She has seen the market transition over the last 14 years in the Middle East. At times her professional work and social awareness work integrates and positions Amruta at a pivotal role in industry or market where she can help businesses with the updated knowledge of new trends in the industry as well as connection to grassroots in the society.
For her extensive experience in the field of sustainability implementation as well as her real influence on UAE society, Amruta also gets invited as an honorary judge at many local as well as international sustainability awards. She is also an advisor at a few international environmental organizations.
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Born in a lush green beautiful town surrounded by mountains and on a riverbank in India, Amruta was a nature lover early on. Trekking & hiking in mountains, gardening, and visiting nearby farms, orchids, and learning about the night sky were some of her favorite activities growing up. So when she started learning about energy and resource conservation during her bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering she was naturally drawn to it. Her full-time job as a sustainability consultant, therefore, is the work she loves and is passionate about. This profession though came as a second option. Professionally trained in classical dance from the age of 5, as a child, she wanted to be a Kathak dancer.
Kalasubai hike with my cousin. It’s the tallest peak in Maharashtra State, India.
Coming from a charitable family, volunteering was always a part of her life. Tree planting, clean-ups, and raising funds for orphanages and local NGOs went parallel throughout her schooling years. With the same spirit of giving back to society, Amruta puts her efforts and passion into the ‘Sustainability Tribe’ to help people understand the know-how of sustainability.
While working on early green building projects in UAE, she struggled at work because of the lack of understanding about the concept of Sustainability. ‘Sustainability’ was almost never heard by many at work and socially. That is when Amruta, a natural problem solver, realized the need for sustainability awareness in society and this is how Sustainability Tribe was born in 2009!
The seed of this thought was first sown when Amruta landed in UAE, back in 2005. Based on her first observations, she found UAE, a consumer’s paradise. Keeping the air conditioning on throughout the year, taking cars even for walkable distances, going shopping just because it’s the weekend, were some of the normal UAE lifestyle choices that bothered her. As a new expatriate, she used to inquire about UAE’s natural environment, the replies she got were ‘there is nothing in the desert, just sand’ or similarly. So she and her husband went on a 7 Emirates tour, to explore the natural beauty of the UAE on their own. She found so much diversity in terms of ecosystems, natural herritage and geographical forms in the UAE. Amruta was intrigued by rich but degrading biodiversity in places like mangroves and even desert dunes. That prompted her to start spreading environmental awareness in the UAE.
Raised close to Nature back home, she sought an outdoor lifestyle in the UAE. Being an avid traveler she is always ready if somebody asks her to go on a camping trip! Seeing her lack of interest in material joys, Amruta’s husband even calls her jokingly a cave-woman.
Over the years Amruta worked and volunteered for many environmental initiatives in UAE like WWF-Emirates Wildlife Society, Emirates Marine Environmental Group, Emirates Environmental Group to make good use of her spare time. Also to learn more about the local environment. That is how her love story with the UAE’s natural environment started. Amruta is associated with many local environmental and sustainability movements and initiatives.
Follow Amruta on Twitter & LinkedIn. If you want to reach her directly, here are the contact details. If you are inspired by her story, then start your sustainable lifestyle journey or become our Ambassador!
