How often is a product used after its lifecycle to engage and create awareness? The brand's product, the sanitary pad, is often used and discreetly discarded due to the taboo surrounding menstruation in India.

Unipads leveraged the afterlife of its product to engage and involve the entire community by encouraging women to dispose used sanitary pads with menstrual blood in compost pits called 'Ukedas.'

This initiative transformed every compost pit in the village into a medium of education, leading to discussions around the benefits of menstrual blood. Farmers in these communities then used blood fertilizer to grow crops in farms.

Blood Fertilizer Case Study
Even in today’s age, there continues to be a taboo about menstruation and those who menstruate. Menstrual blood is still considered one of the most impure things in a house, not just in rural areas but even in cities. There are beliefs that menstrual blood can ruin food and that even its smell can turn milk sour. As a result, women in rural feel oppressed and hardly talk about periods, or ask for access to menstrual hygiene. Our initiative is to present menstrual blood in a new light using science.

Geeta Solanki

Founder of Unipads

Taboos surrounding menstrual blood are widespread in India. This is why you will hear news like ‘students trying to enter the kitchen made to strip to check if they were menstruating’, or extreme versions like ‘menstrual blood sold for black magic’. In Gujarat, menstrual blood is seen as one of the most impure things around food. 82% of women in rural Gujarat are still not allowed inside kitchens or anywhere close to crops or food while menstruating. They believe that even a single drop of menstrual blood can destroy entire crops. These practices discourage women from openly discussing periods and sometimes even from using sanitary pads, leading to period shaming and period poverty.

Unipads, a reusable sanitary brand, is always at the forefront of tackling taboos and advocating for change. It has been awarded by the Government of India (NITI AAYOG) for bringing transformation in the nation. The brand has successfully tackled issues like forced leave for 'Adeli' women in the food industry while menstruating.

To address the broader issue, it was imperative to raise awareness and educate entire families and communities, enabling them to experience firsthand the benefits of using menstrual blood to grow food and to challenge the taboos they believed in.

Taboos persist, claiming that menstrual blood can spoil food and crops. However, scientific evidence contradicts this belief: menstrual blood contains higher levels of essential nutrients such as nitrogen (102%), phosphorus (209%), and potassium (230%), these are beneficial for crop growth. In our efforts to challenge these taboos, we utilized the most essential element in agriculture: compost.

Compost pits, known as ‘Ukedas’ in Gujarat, served as our solution. We encouraged women to dispose their certified organic pads containing menstrual blood in these pits.

With over 70% of the rural population engaged in farming, 'Ukedas' are a ubiquitous feature in village landscapes. Here, cattle dung, leftover animal fodder, foliage, vegetable scraps, and food waste are collected throughout the year. At the onset of the farming season, the compost from the 'Ukeda' is used as fertilizer in farms.

With this insight, the same blood once feared to destroy crops now helps grow them.

Unipads launched an initiative asking women to dispose of their used sanitary pads with menstrual blood in ‘Ukedas’. These GOTS certified organic pads break down and release nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium into compost to form blood fertilizer. These essential nutrients facilitate crop growth.

The same blood once feared to destroy crops now helps grow them.

Thousands of these compost pits were marked to encourage others to join and act as mediums to spread awareness. 45+ varieties of crops were grown with blood fertilizer, debunking the myths once and for all.

• Thousands of compost pits turned into spaces for spreading awareness.

• 45+ varieties of produce were grown with blood fertilizer, including 624 tons of groundnut, 48 tons of cumin, 5 tons of wheat, and 72 tons of vegetables such as tomatoes, carrots, beetroots, cabbage, etc.

• Elected members of the Indian Parliament and Gujarat Legislative Assembly made public

appeal to 1.6 million people, urging them to break the taboos.

• Elected members, including Dr. Payalben Kukrani, Dr. Darshita Shah, Bhagabhai Dhanabhai Barad, and Hemant Ahir promised strict action against injustice arising from taboo beliefs

• 100k+ farmers now encourage women around food when menstruating.

• 5 NGOs like Manav Sadhna, Saath & Impact Guru have joined us to scale up these efforts.

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Awards

D&AD Awards

D&AD Awards

2024

Wood Pencil

Press

‘Blood Fertiliser’: Unipads Launches Project To Dispel Taboos Around Menstruation
The CSR Universe
Blood fertiliser: Set fire to taboos around periods and menstrual blood this Holi
Voice of Healthcare

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