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"A nation that destroys its soils destroys itself. Forests are the lungs of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people."
June's event was set in the idyllic MyFarm, in and amongst its innovative learning labs, sustainable technologies, and micro-gardens was a green event the whole family could enjoy!
The families enjoyed shopping all things eco-friendly. We had some amazing workshops...The Women's Initiative's Briquettes making was a particular highlight! And of course, children learned with the amazing MyFarm staff all about sustainability and climate change.
As usual, we had an amazing selection of guest speakers to grace the stage, including the infamous Maurice, from Sandeli Foundation who delivered a fantastic talk all about the importance of trees.
And...Environmental NGOs from all around the country gather to connect and share knowledge, ideas, and skills!
The Plant Our Future Competition was all about regreening Gambia...starting with the schools.
Schools were asked to plant as many seedlings as they could, with as much variety as possible before the 26th June...This would hopefully create a green space the school could use for years to come...Both beautiful and productive
And the winner got 5000D 2nd-2000 And the top 3 each got a selection of seedlings.
Congratulations To Sareh Marie Dobo Lower Basic School!!! You Created The Best Green Space In Your School & Won 5000GMD!
Promoting eco and sustainable businesses and organisations is so important to us. We want everyone to see the ingenious solutions these guys are coming up with. The Gambian vendors were incredible and had everything from Moringa oils, to handwoven fabrics to recycled tyre composting bins and even turning plastic waste into beautiful artwork.
The green community in The Gambia is small but is growing, fast. We want to be at the forefront of this change and provide a platform for even the smallest Green Gambian to show off their work. We were so proud to be able to connect these vendors to the public and each other to share ideas on how we can all work together for a Greener future for Gambia.
Find all our Growing Green Gambian Vendors Here
Practical
Engaging Gambia's youth is so important to securing the environmental future of this beautiful country! Providing them with fun practical learning activities gives them the knowledge and inspiration to energise them in the future. MyFarm was therefore the perfect partner for this months event.
Environmental
We engage environmental organizations already operating within the Gambia to come up with activities the whole family can enjoy! This event featured charcoal replacement briquette making from the Women's initiative, seed planting with Kantora Action For Green, Bead artwork with Banko Foundation, and many other amazing activities facilitated by MyFarm too.
Education
Plant our future was all about educating the country on the importance of regreening the country. So this months installment of Growing A Green Gambia included activities and education all about the importance of trees, how and why to avoid using them for charcoal, and energised schools to create green areas through our Plant Our Future competition.
Guest Speakers
Together Africa
Lamin Jammeh, founder of Together Africa spoke about the importance of the continued protection of Gambia's only 2 remaining forests. These forests are being chopped down at an alarming rate and the work they are doing to help protect it is inspiring.
Banko Foundation
Jim Njie spoke about the foundation's engagement with sustainable living and trainings. They are actively supporting and training volunteers who are passionate about the future and wish to support a greener future for the Gambia.
Clean Earth Gambia
Maimuna gave a talk on various different strategies to measure the impacts of climate change currently affecting The Gambia. Her talk also provided insight into possible solutions of the future
Wildlife Conservation Trust
Ousman form Wildlife Conservation Trust highlighted the declining Bee population in the country, and passionately spoke on the beneficial effect Bees have on the Gambian environment.
Sandele Foundation
Maurice from Sandele Foundation kicked off the day with a brilliant and informative talk on the importance of trees. He expertly described to the listeners how trees can have a huge impact on the communities they live in and the health and long-term sustainability of farming within them. Sadly about 2 weeks after this talk his predictions were highlighted by some of the worst storms to hit the Gambia for a long long time, devastating communities that have a long history of cutting down their trees.
Maurice also suggested the beginnings of a Gambian Environmental Alliance, something very close to our hearts. More on this, hopefully very soon.
Partner: MyFarm Africa Startup
MyFarm is a beautiful one-hectare farm with mixed fruit orchards and a residential education center for children, young people and farmers, that provides an exciting educational journey from seed to business, and encourages students to dare to ask ‘Why?’ and to discover their own answers.
MyFarm is a creative hub where knowledge and skills are shared through innovative learning techniques.
Partner: My Gambia
My Gambia is the personal assistant of the country. They are the premier information website and magazine in the Gambia, offering expertise in the country, its people, history, and traditions. Ran by Ursa, a fantastic and enthusiastic lady, My Gambia were the perfect partner for the event.
Keep an eye out for their film about the event, they captured green Gambians beautifully.
Website: https://www.my-gambia.com/
Partner: Clean Earth Gambia
To make this event happen we had to find a Gambian organisation that cared about the Gambian environmental crisis and who is actively involved in helping to fix it. We found that in Clean Earth Gambia. Clean Earth Gambia is a non-profit organisation dedicated to creating awareness about the environment, especially climate change, and building the capacity of communities to work towards climate action.
They are a student-led team from the University of The Gambia, led by an amazing woman Fatou. We are so excited to be partnering with this young and energetic team.
Kantora Action For Green is an organisation that will always be close to our heart. They do wonderful things in their community and beyond, using an innovative model that combines fun and energetic sporting activities with educational community outreach activities based around the environment.
Rather than push community activities on youths, they have cleverly realized that engaging them through sport yields fantastic results, so instead of asking children to simply come and do some tree planting, they use football and other sports to get the children engaged, and during their breaks, they plant trees for the community.
The kids love this, and working with KAG means that they get access to some of the best sporting equipment in the country.
