Pawan Govind’s journey into the resource recovery sector wasn’t a straight line – it was a winding road filled with unexpected turns, academic pivots, and a growing awareness of environmental and social impact. Today, as the national resource recovery manager for Endeavour Foundation in Queensland, Govind is driving change in the sustainability sector.
Raised in Gracemere, just outside Rockhampton, and of Indo-Fijian descent, Govind spent his early years surrounded by the open spaces of regional Queensland and the cultural heritage of the Pacific.
“I never really had an exact idea of what I wanted to do growing up,” he said. “For a long time, I thought I’d pursue medical school.”
That early interest led him to a Bachelor of Science at the University of Queensland, which he later redirected into a major in neuroscience.
“That was more to give me time when I finished, to decide – did I want to go into medicine, or did I want to get into research?”
He even sat the medical entrance exams and progressed to an offer. But after much soul-searching, he decided not to go down that road. He didn’t want to spend another six years at university. Following this decision, Govind returned to Rockhampton to help manage his father’s business.
“My dad is a land surveyor and town planner,” he said. “Growing up, I worked with him for as long as I can remember, either out in the field or on the business side of things.
“Once I finished my undergrad, I decided I didn’t want to go to med school. I went back up to Rocky and worked with him as an operations manager.”
That stint as operations manager provided exposure to small business operations and decision-making, but Govind still felt the pull toward further education. He considered postgraduate study and was set to go to law school – until a seemingly random advertisement caught his attention.
“This ad popped up for environmental health,” he said. “I thought to myself, ‘I’ve never looked at what environmental health is, who environmental health officers are’. It was really niche, but interesting.”
Govind enrolled in a Graduate Diploma in Environmental Health at QUT and followed it up with further postgraduate studies in climate science, reflecting his growing passion for environmental issues and global sustainability. Govind’s first job in the field came with South Burnett Regional Council in Kingaroy, where he expected to stay for a year. Instead, he remained for nearly five years.
“I started in environmental health, doing routine public health-type work. But being at a smaller council meant you got exposed to everything, including waste,” Govind said.
Mentored by a manager who oversaw multiple departments, Govind gradually transitioned from public health into waste management. Govind started supporting more on the technical and reporting side, and eventually moved into a new role that combined both areas. That role evolved into the coordinator of waste management.
“We had a large number of closed legacy landfill sites out there. My now-wife, who’s from Kingaroy, used to hate how every time we drove somewhere, I’d point out, ‘there’s an old landfill,’” he said.
Eventually, after planning a move to Brisbane, Govind started looking for his next step. That’s when he found the listing at Endeavour Foundation.
“I had no idea what Endeavour Foundation did in the waste space,” he recalled. “But I applied and got the job. And I’ve been here ever since.”
Govind joined Endeavour Foundation in December 2021 as operations manager of Recycling and Waste Management.
His current role oversees a network of resource recovery centres (RRCs) and recycling initiatives across Australia.
To understand the scale of his responsibility, it helps to know a bit about Endeavour Foundation. As Australia’s largest employer of people with disability, the organisation operates 28 Business Solutions sites across Queensland, NSW and Victoria, providing employment opportunities to people with a disability. At many of these facilities, people with a disability carry out commercial recycling work in areas like e-waste dismantling, document destruction, and general recycling.
“We operate waste facilities on behalf of councils, either directly or through service partners. That’s what is referred to as the RRCs, and falls under the stream of government solutions. Then we also have business solutions where we provide employment to people with a disability across a range of commercial activities, including recycling,” he said.
Govind’s role spans both streams.
“I hold responsibility for the RRCs and commercial relationships related to our recycling operations at business solutions sites ,” he said. “That includes everything from managing contract obligations with service partners to finding new material recovery opportunities.”
His daily work ranges from ensuring compliance with service contracts to building partnerships with downstream recycling processors.
He said it’s not just about meeting obligations, but asking: “what else can we do? Can we recover more? Can we generate more environmental and social value?”
For Govind, the job is more than a technical or managerial challenge, it’s personal. He didn’t think he’d find a role that motivated him not just environmentally, but also socially. He believes the Pacific Islands are on the frontlines of climate change, so environmental responsibility has always been close to his heart. He said he gets to combine that with employment outcomes for people with disabilities, which is a dual benefit.
That duality is shaping the future of Endeavour Foundation’s strategy in resource recovery, strengthening pathways to mainstream employment. The Endeavour Foundation has already had success in facilitating the transition of individuals from supported employment within its business solutions sites to mainstream employment within their RRCs. The organisation wants to keep building on that, according to Govind.
Govind is also candid about the issues the sector is grappling with. At the top of his list? Plastics and transport logistics.
“Plastics are a huge issue, and they continue to be in the industry,” he said. “Even when there are recycling and processing options available, you can lose all viability because you have to put it on a truck and send it to Brisbane, Sydney or Melbourne.”
That raises a difficult question: do the environmental benefits of recycling offset the emissions generated by long-distance transport? It’s a challenging juxtaposition, according to Govind, because he said you can lose both environmental and commercial value.
Govind doesn’t shy away from suggesting reforms. One idea he supports is product stewardship schemes that are both mandatory and far-reaching.
“It’s a little controversial,” he said, “but I think we need mandatory product stewardship for all hard to recycle/recover items. It’s just too hard to make anything work viably otherwise. You really need to be front-loading the cost at
the beginning.”
For Govind, systemic change is necessary to support remote and regional recyclers – those facing the dual barriers of distance and market access.
“The challenge in Queensland is always going to be doing it over distance,” he said. “But if we can make these systems more circular, more connected, and more inclusive, then we’re really making a difference, not just environmentally, but socially too.”