Opinion | The Generation That Made Sustainability Go Mainstream

If earlier generations built physical foundations and millennials reshaped behavioural norms around sustainability, what will relevance look like for Gen Alpha & Beta in AI age?

This piece began, as many unexpectedly important conversations do, with a late-night discussion about what the next generation will have to build in order to stay relevant, especially in families that are still actively involved in running and growing multi-generational businesses.

As Gen Alpha begins to come of age, and Gen Beta grows up in a world already shaped by climate anxiety and environmental awareness, the expectation that they will have to build something equally consequential feels inevitable.

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The question on the table was simple: which generation has contributed the most to society in terms of infrastructure?

The obvious answer was the generations that unfortunately dealt with war.

Most large-scale infrastructure development in the modern world followed periods of conflict. Post-war reconstruction gave us highways, aviation systems, public housing, electrification, manufacturing corridors, and the early foundations of global trade. Industrialisation accelerated in response to destruction. Countries rebuilt faster, larger, and more systematically after wars because they had to.

So, if you look at physical infrastructure like transport networks, power grids, or telecommunications, earlier generations had an undeniable impact. They poured concrete, laid tracks, built dams, and wired cities.

Then I got thinking about my generation. The millennials. For a brief moment, it felt like the most consequential thing we had collectively built was social media. Which, to be fair, is not nothing. But the more I sat with the question, the clearer it became that physical infrastructure is only one way a generation can leave its mark. Behaviour can be infrastructural too.

Sustainability isn’t new. We’ve had environmental laws for decades. Companies have spoken about Corporate Social Responsibility for years. In fact, India even made CSR mandatory in 2013, requiring certain companies to allocate 2 per cent of their profits toward social and environmental causes. But for a long time, CSR felt more like optics than overhaul. It was about companies demonstrating responsibility, managing reputation, and checking compliance boxes, rather than rethinking how their businesses fundamentally operated.

Millennials changed the visibility of that conversation. Over the past decade, everyday consumption has become one of the most widely used tools for signalling personal values. Sustainability moved out of policy documents and into shopping decisions. Questions that once lived inside supplier audits began appearing at checkout counters: Who made this? What is it made of? How far did it travel? What happens when I am done using it?

Cruelty-free labels, which once felt niche or inconvenient, became aspirational. There was a time when wanting vegan options or ethical sourcing felt like an unnecessary complication. Today, kindness is cool.

Resale platforms are no longer associated with financial constraint but with conscious consumption. Plant-based menu options have moved from specialty cafés to mainstream restaurant chains. Refillable packaging, ingredient transparency, and ethical certifications are now baseline expectations.

Millennials came of age during the 2008 financial crisis. We entered adulthood watching institutions wobble and promises fall apart. At the same time, we had the internet in our hands, which meant information was no longer filtered. We could see supply chains, scandals, labour conditions and environmental damage in real time. And while my generation wasn’t writing policies back then, we were choosing where to spend. Alongside early regulations, this cultural shift led to the rise of ethical products and services.

This raises an interesting question for the generations that follow. If earlier generations built the physical foundations of modern society, and millennials reshaped behavioural norms around sustainability, what will relevance look like for Gen Alpha and Gen Beta in the age of AI?

Juveca Panda Chheda is an entrepreneur, writer and unapologetic slow-living advocate who believes mindfulness should come with a sense of humour. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the writer. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.

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