TOYP Singapore 2019

Melissa Lam

Honouree · Moral & Environmental

Year

2019

Biography

Melissa Lam, widely known as “Bamboo Straw Girl,” is a Singaporean sustainability entrepreneur, environmental educator, and founder of Bamboo Straw Girl Pte Ltd — a homegrown social enterprise she formally incorporated in 2018 after years of grassroots work that began in 2013. Her journey into sustainability began during a camping trip with friends when she was struck by the irony of bringing single-use plastic into nature, prompting her to adopt a zero-waste lifestyle and eventually turn her passion into a business.

What started as personally crafting bamboo straws — inspired by a bamboo craftsman she met in Japan — evolved into a full zero-waste lifestyle e-store stocking over 100 unique sustainable products, all made in small batches by independent artisans in Southeast Asia, primarily in Bali and Java, Indonesia.

Bamboo Straw Girl was Singapore’s very first zero-waste lifestyle store, operating before “zero-waste” became a mainstream buzzword, and partners with makers — the majority of whom are women — to provide them with full-time employment or supplementary income streams.

Beyond running her enterprise, Melissa is also a trained English Language teacher, a licensed facilitator of the 2030 SDGs Game, and a public speaker who regularly conducts school assembly programmes, corporate workshops, and TEDx talks to advocate for mindful consumption and climate action.

Achievements

To date, Bamboo Straw Girl has helped replace nearly 3 million disposable plastic straws and empowered over a dozen independent Southeast Asian makers through employment or supplementary income, making a tangible impact on both environmental and economic fronts.

The enterprise has engaged thousands of individuals across schools, organisations, and community groups in Singapore, running free school outreach programmes aligned with the Singapore Green Plan and the UN Sustainable Development Goals — specifically SDG 8 (Decent Work), SDG 12 (Sustainable Consumption), and SDG 13 (Climate Action).

Melissa has been recognised by Green Is The New Black as one of their green changemakers, described as “brilliantly bonkers for bamboo” for sparking meaningful environmental conversations in a lighthearted way.

She was featured as one of five small business owners spotlighted in a CNA/Mothership feature on resilient Singapore businesses, and her story has been covered internationally by outlets including CNA938, Vulcan Post, and Asian Journeys.

Bamboo Straw Girl is a registered member of raiSE (Singapore Centre for Social Enterprise) since 2018, and was selected to be featured in a Bombay Sapphire film series highlighting pioneering Singaporeans taking creative steps towards sustainability.

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