Jayant Sarnaik

Jayant Sarnaik, based in Pune, Maharashtra, India is founding member and joint director of the Applied Environmental Research Foundation (AERF), a conservation NGO. He has been active in the field of sustainable biofuels since 1998. In the early phase of his involvement, he along with his colleagues successfully developed and piloted indigenous technology for complete treatment and recycling of wastewater from molasses-based ethanol distilleries. He holds the Indian patent for the same. About 10 years ago, he started looking at sustainable utilisation of native oilseed species for decentralised production of biofuels in the Western Ghats – a biodiversity hotspot. For his concept of mainstreaming biodiversity for sustainable biofuel production, he received the IUCN’s practitioner fellowship in conservation and sustainability. He is currently engaged in smallholder certification and industry uptake of the RSB standard in India.