MAIN FEATURE
It is time to challenge incrementalism, to stop trying to fix parts without reimagining the whole.
Organo Naandi (India, 2017) is an upper middle-class residential enclave on the outskirts of Hyderabad20
Residents here were sold on the idea of a healthy lifestyle, away from the noise and pollution of the big city. This promise translated into on-site production of organic food, clean water and energy. Some of these targets were met by procuring technology; most relied on forging a relationship with nearby farming communities. The estate became a catalyst for change, bringing organic farming techniques to the community-at-large, restoring a once depleted aquifer and enticing biodiversity. The 70 villas of phase one sold out quickly. The second phase, with 45 new villas, is now underway.
The first takeaway from these stories is that the conversation needs a reboot. The repair of natural and community networks, resulting in healthier settings for humans and other forms of life, can lead to profit. Financial capital—often the most touted—grows as a direct result of these actions. The second takeaway is interdependence of scales: how building, neighbourhood and city talk to each other. In past sustainability discourses, change was either top-down or bottom-up, something that happened within a building or a city. Regenerative design and whole systems thinking tell us it is both.
More than anywhere in the world today, there is a compelling moral and practical case for regeneration
in Asia. We have been distracted far too long by the allure of profitable Green, a belief that developers, acting out of self-interest, would do good. And that this good, accrued over time, would benefit all life and ultimately the planet. This didn’t pan out. Instead, social and economic gaps between groups have widened; the destruction of natural and social capitals have accelerated. It is time to challenge incrementalism, to stop trying to fix parts without reimagining the whole. Regenerative design engages all scales, creating partnerships between human-made and natural systems. Our capacity to act on this is held back by habits and mindsets and, sometimes, a lack of imagination.
Information on the author’s book, Ecopuncture – Transforming Architecture and Urbanism is Asia, can be found at
ecopuncture-asia.com. Several accompanying videos can be viewed online. Search ‘Ecopuncture Asia’ on YouTube.
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3 Nirmal Kishnani, Ecopuncture: Transforming Architecture and Urbanism in Asia, (Singapore, FuturArc, 2019). 4
5 6
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17 18
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19
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