Another Month, Another Capacity Building Workshop!

Written by Ms. Tyler and Ms.Mazoud

Our participants during the workshops

Dar Si Hmad organized the last TWO workshops for the Capacity Building Program! Our participants have gained so many insights on their experiences and aspirations, and we can’t wait to see how they use their new knowledge to benefit their communities.

The third week of March marked the fifth workshop for the capacity building program for NGOs. Our trainer Soufiyan Saaoudi led this workshop which was about Leadership, Team building Skills, and Communications. 

We were very lucky to learn from the experience and expertise of our trainer, Mr. Soufiyan and to bring his own perspective on how to manage an NGO, as the president of the Youth EmpowermentSociety - YES organization.

Throughout these sessions, we trained our participants to create a communication strategy with an emphasis on the importance of digital communication and marketing. 

For our team building skills session, we took our participants to the roof where we played many games that encourage and teach our participants how to work within a team.

The trainer Soufiyan during the fifth workshop

For April’s workshop we gave the opportunity to our participants to choose the topics they still want to learn about, they voted for finding funding! Our final training session occurred April 21-22, where our trainer Imane El Ouizgani led two sessions for our participants, one on fund generating activities and the other on finding and writing grants applications.

On the first day, participants brainstormed ideas for fund-generating activities for their own NGOs in order to strengthen their NGOs’ financial viability and expand their available resources. Participants gave feedback to each other on how they could make their programs more competitive and profitable. 

We also worked with our participants to develop business plans for their fund-generating activities that they could use to propose their ideas to their boards and potential funding sources.  Participants also made SWOT analyses and GANTT charts of their proposed projects, so they could visualize the necessary steps they need to take to make their ideas into realities.

Our participants during one of our rooftop activities 

On the second day, we explored another source of income for NGOs—grants! Imane covered the grant application process from start to finish, including the technical challenges of understanding grant requirements and registering for application portals.

Participants gained experience in using effective keywords when searching for grants and were introduced to components of effective storytelling in writing grants. We also introduced our participants to crowdfunding platforms, focusing on our partner, Global Giving.

The ultimate purpose of this workshop was to make progress on applying the knowledge participants have gained during this training to creating social impact in their own communities. 

One of the greater objectives of this DSH initiative is to equip our participants with the skills to launch new projects at their own NGOs. So far many of our participants have exciting ideas for new initiatives they intend to launch after honing their skills through the Capacity Building Workshop. 

We hope to meet individually with our participants soon so we can learn more details about their progress in launching these new projects and provide advice as needed. We look forward to meeting with our participants for one final time as a complete group for our closing ceremony in June!

Trainer Imane during the sixth workshop

Preparing for RISE Citizen Journalism 2019!

Written by DSH Intern: Imane Arjdal

After so many months, the time has finally come to launch our newest edition of the RISE program. Since 2013, during each academic year, Dar Si Hmad offers a training program for various beneficiaries, students, and apprentices living in Agadir that contains workshops, conferences and personal and professional development activities that run for 2 to 6 months.

This year marks the seventh edition of RISE program which will be under the theme of citizen journalism. This program aims to offer training on how to use media to promote environmental justice and a wide range of social issues including educational and global topics.

This edition of the RISE program will include sessions on citizen journalism ethics, writing techniques, photojournalism, videojournalism, podcasting, broadcasting, and many other interesting topics. This year’s RISE program will be different from the traditional classroom sessions and will instead give the beneficiaries the best knowledge in a welcoming atmosphere filled with dialogue, positivity, and support.

At the end of each session, participants will have to do an assignment to apply what they have learned and eventually to work toward publishable contents. Late June will mark the conclusion of the program, participants will present final projects in order to graduate the program.

We launched the applications on February 14th. We were surprised by the number of applicants we received and of the high quality of the applications. We selected more than forty applicants to be interviewed. Through the interview, we knew more about our potential risers, their background, their interests and their motivation for the program.

After many discussions, we were finally able to decide the foremost and best-suited applicants based on their applications, essays, and performance during the interview. We ultimately selected 24 applicants that showed the most motivation for the program.

Dar Si Hmad’s team is really excited for this year’s RISE program on Citizen Journalism, and we can’t wait to meet the participants and for them to start a new journey of knowledge, support, gaining new skills, setting objectives, and experimenting with new approaches that will help them become creators of their own future.  

Opération café (Operation coffee)

Written by DSH Intern: Ayman Taleb

Dar Si Hmad (DSH) officially started “l’opération café” in August 2018. This operation is about a partnership with restaurants and coffee shops in order to collect their organic waste. The main objective of DSH is to create a compost for its project of Agdal farm. This operation is raising awareness to the need to sort out waste.

The farm situated in Ait Baamrane was put at the disposal of the Association by the beneficiaries of the famous fog project on the mount Boutmezguida. In the region of Sidi Ifni, this farm will become a didactic nursery presenting the implementation of sustainable agricultural practices, the valuation of the old farming practices of the Al Andalus, and the capitalization of the knowledge and the local customs.

Moreover, the creation of worthy economic opportunities (processed and raw products with high added value) makes it possible to mitigate the rural migration. Finally, training in irrigation techniques will be an opportunity to raise awareness about the low-cost use of water.

The first challenge of this farm project is the regeneration of soils. Indeed, the desertification due to the aridity of the region gets worse year after year with the decrease of organic matter rates. Opération café (operation coffee) is a direct answer to the effects of soil degradation. By collecting mainly coffee waste, sugar canes, and other fruits wastes, it will be possible to compost the organic matter to give life and revive the soil.

The preparatory phase of the operation consisted of creating a new dedicated logo (label). In this way, any other individual or legal entity who needs to collect organic matter for its soil regeneration project can become a distributor of this logo. Several agroecological project holders already collect organic waste from their partners.

The logo above is directly part of raising awareness of waste management that is considered as an important pillar of the Green Morocco Plan (Plan Maroc Vert). As a partner in this project, the restaurant and coffee shop owner declares to be aware and conscious of the evolution 99-12 law, where there’s the national charter of the environment and sustainable development. The restaurant owner is proactive in preparing her / his staff for the need of sorting out waste and seeks to reduce its volume.

The second phase began in the middle of August with the distribution of the bins that are dedicated to collect coffee grounds. These bins relate information and contain the logo of the coffee operation.

The third phase will consist of the regular production of compost in Agdal farm which we will continue writing about in future posts.

Lack of information, the resistance to the change or the management of space are the first walls to be broken by restaurants and coffee managers. Here we greet the first five restaurants that have agreed to be part of this Challenge.

If you want to encourage this campaign and be a changemaker just by drinking coffee, you can visit our first partners which are:

- Pizzatino: located in Avenue Al Mouqawama

Pizzatino Staff with our intern Ayman Taleb (manager of operation cafe)

- Rituels: Located In front of Lobnan mosque, Agadir.

Moulay Youssef, the barista is very enthusiastic about the operation café

- La Fontaine: Located in Avenue Hassan II, Agadir.

Manager of La Fontaine with Ayman

- Orange: Located in 8 Rue des Orangers, Agadir.

Our intern Ayman at Orange Cafe

- La Cossa Vanille: Intersection avenue El Mouqwama and Rue de Marrakech,Agadir.

Our director Jamila Bargach and Intern ayman
at Restaurant Cafe La Cossa Vanille

The coffee operation is a win-win project aimed at inspiring each actor to become aware of the environmental crisis. This publication is a call to the restaurants and coffee shop owners of Agadir to join this pilot project.

We are very optimistic about the rest of this project and we will keep you updated on our future partnership and progress.