Hajiba Boumasmar HAF Tree Monitoring Officer On Monday, 20 January, the High Atlas Foundation commemorated the annual day of tree planting when most of the members of the Foundation came out with Moroccan and foreign volunteers to plant organic trees in the various Moroccan provinces: Al-Haouz, Agadir, Youssoufia, Rabat, and Fez. This day saw the

Sanae Benaadim HAF’s Office Manager Every third Monday of January, HAF takes the initiative of planting trees in different places around Morocco. I heard many positive things about this special day back when I was a volunteer. And I wished to be part of it one day! President Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir, USAID Driver Lahcen Ait

يوم وطني نظمته مؤسسة الاطلس الكبير بقلم محمد القادري متدرب مع مؤسسة الاطلس الكبير تحتفل مؤسسة الاطلس الكبير في كل سنة بيوم وطني تسعى من خلاله الى غرس العديد من الاشجار بجل مناطق المغرب لخلق الشعور بالارتباط وتعزيز بناء الشراكات ولما لهذه المبادرة ايضا من اهمية كبيرة سواء من خلال التشجيع على ثقافة التشجيرأو على

By Errachid Montassir Project Manager Every third Monday of January is the High Atlas Foundation’s annual event “Tree Planting Day.” On this date, all staff members and volunteers come together and plant organic fruit trees across nearly a dozen regions in Morocco. My site this year was the Sbaiaat municipality in El youssoufia province, where

By Nic Pantelick HAF Volunteer My Tree Planting Day began with a rain-soaked Marrakech morning. For the first time since I had arrived in Morocco, I felt the chill of winter cutting through me. This biting cold wormed its way past my meager layers and rested an icy hand on the back of my neck.

By Imane Akhezzane HAF Project Manager A l’occasion de la journée nationale de plantation d’arbres qu’organise la fondation du Haut Atlas (HAF) chaque année, j’ai eu la chance de  visiter le lycée d’Asni, le collège, dar Talib, Dar Taliba et Dar Alfatat pour planter 100 arbres amandiers, et grenadiers. Des membres de la direction des

– Let’s make it green on January 20th: High Atlas Foundation will Plant Thousands of Trees, The Policy Times, 18 January 2020. MARRAKECH, Morocco – Jan. 10, 2020 – As the new year begins, the High Atlas Foundation (HAF) would like to invite Moroccan communities to aid in the planting of thousands of trees on Monday,

HAF Intern After our team had a traditional breakfast in the town of Asni, we needed to go further into the atlas to help the greenhouse nurseries expand. Our first destination was a nursery in Imigdal. They had one greenhouse and a few terraces. There were approximately 30,000 fruit trees, with a variety of food

Le Jeudi 9 janvier 2020, j’étais très heureux de pouvoir assister à un atelier au lycée de Touama, j’ai pu voir des différences culturelles illustrées par  les opinions des jeunes du Maroc et du Brésil et la plus remarquable est la conscience de la nécessité de protéger l’environnement. Le Brésil est responsable de la garde

Errachid Montassir HAF Project Manager Recently, the High Atlas Foundation and Kids International Dental Services organization (KIDS) came together to help advance rural children’s health care. KIDS’ leader Alison Blue and I visited Anamer and Ait Lkak villages in Oukaimdan (Al Houz) and Bouchan (Rhamna). We were there to arrange and prepare for an upcoming

Prof. Ellen Hernandez HAF Volunteer On a sunny, winter morning, our team leaves the HAF office for Al Haouz province. Today, we will visit two nurseries with an American business expert – a USAID Farmer-to-Farmer Volunteer – who will devise a plan for each cooperative to help improve productivity. Our team includes our driver, the

By Professor Ellen Hernandez HAF Volunteer The High Atlas Foundation’s office in Marrakech is a beehive of activity. I am a new volunteer who arrived in Morocco yesterday and already met with office staff. Today, I have been invited to return to meet Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir, the HAF president, and I have just entered during

Nic Pantelick HAF Volunteer Yesterday, I traded the sprawling city of Marrakech for the rolling foothills and winding roads of the Moroccan countryside. Watching this buzzing metropolis retreat through the back window of the car we rode in, I was filled with excitement. After an hour of driving and stop for lunch, we arrived at

Karam-Yane Azzabi, Tahannaout HAF Financial Manager From 25 to 27 November 2019, in Tahannaout (Al Haouz province, Morocco), several public sector actors local association representatives participated in a strategic planning training session along with High Atlas Foundation (HAF) members Amina El Hajjami (Project Director) and Karam-Yane Azzabi (Financial Manager). This event was sponsored by Morocco’s

– Youth Entrepreneurship In Community, Ethiopian Observer, By Yossef Ben-Meir (HAF President), 15 January 2020. • Arabic: Al-Watan Voice, 22 December 2019. Moroccan youth today, whether urban or rural based, face enormous obstacles in achieving their self-development and in creating the improvements they seek for their families, communities, country, and even for the world. As they know all too well,

Hajiba Boumasmar HAF Monitoring Officer For the entire day at the headquarters of the High Atlas Foundation in Marrakech, a meeting took place with HAF’s nursery caretakers, together with HAF’s President Yossef, Director of Projects Amina, Project Manager Said, and Monitoring Officer Hajiba. As part of the 2020 project to plant in 11 nurseries 1.2

By Katie Bercegeay HAF Project Manager On December 14, 2019, law students at University Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah convened for the third of six training-workshops designed to prepare them to deliver pro bono legal aid at a faculty-housed Clinique Juridique, or legal clinic, starting in early 2020. USMBA Law Professor Professor Lamzaraa facilitated a training

By Nora Martetschläger HAF Intern Last week, I had the chance to experience part of developing our new HAF tree nursery. Together with my colleagues Amina and Said, I traveled around 200 kilometers from Marrakech to Ourzazarte, to meet relevant stakeholders of the new project at the governor’s office. The new HAF nursery will be

By Karam Yane Azzabi HAF Project Manager As part of the Bureau of Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs (OES) project activities, Imane and I – respectively the OES project manager and the OES coordinator in the High Atlas Foundation –  went to the Mohammed VI Technical High School in Marrakech on Friday 27th of

By Katie Bercegeay HAF Project Manager On Friday, December 27, law students at University Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah in Fes gathered to continue in a series of training workshops preparing them to work in a faculty-housed pro bono law clinic in 2020. The morning began with a short exercise to practice active listening. Students–and even

يقال أن لأعياد نهاية السنة سحر خاص فبعد مشاركتي أصدقاء لي عشاء الكريسمس، ذهبت في الصباح لمؤسسة الأطلس الكبير التي اتخذت من حماية البيئة و تشجيع التنمية المستدامة هدفا لها و التي أشتغل فيها متطوع. كعادته سعيد يحمل أخبارا سعيدة. بالله أمين نحن ذاهبون إلى الميدان فهل تود الحضور؟ نعم و كيف لا، فشرف لي

BY NORA MARTETSCHLÄGER HAF INTERN A new day, a new trip! After our visit on the Ouarzazarte nursery land Amina, Said and me traveled to the Toubkal commune in order to check the progress of expanding the nursery there. The journey itself definitely wasn’t one of my favorites – the road was very curvy, and

– Empowering Rural Participation and Partnerships in Morocco’s Sustainable Development, Journal of Global initiatives, By Yossef Ben-Meir (HAF President), 15 November 2019. Abstract This essay explores the vast potential for participatory and sustainable human development in Morocco. Though Morocco is a country with many diverse resources, it remains burdened by severe levels of poverty and illiteracy, and

Foremost to acknowledge is to read the thirty-page development model as an analysis of potential implementation strategy where governmental framework designations remain in script. Given Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir’s scope, having arrived in Morocco many years earlier, and followed by top-tier academic, managerial, and educational positions, each covering the vast range of collecting, interpreting, and sharing

Dear Friend, The year has almost reached its end. For HAF, it’s the time to plant trees. Planting trees with farming families and schools in Morocco is an act of empowering recognition and strategic development. It acknowledges the priorities of rural communities and is a vehicle for people’s driven change and transformation. With complete hope

By Kerstin Opfer Operations Manager North Africa is one of the world’s most vulnerable regions to climate change and characterised by severe environmental degradation. This compromises already scarce natural resources and thereby the countries’ economic performance, which is heavily dependent on natural capital such as agriculture, phosphates, mineral resources and fisheries. This in turn also

HAF Project Manager Twenty-nine master’s and doctorate-level law students participated in the second of a series of workshops and trainings designed to prepare the students to work in a new law clinic to be housed at the Faculty of Juridical, Economic, and Social Sciences at the University Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah in Fes. Fourteen of

Hajiba Boumamsar HAF Project Assistant On 4 and 5 November 2019, the High Atlas Foundation (HAF) organized a Multi-Stakeholder Partnerships (MSP) workshop in collaboration with Germanwatch, a German NGO. The workshop aimed at developing a common understanding of the challenges and solutions for a decentralized energy transition towards 100% renewables in Morocco and all Africa.

By Kerstin Opfer HAF’s Operations Manager We are living in a time where humankind faces an unprecedented challenge – it is the warmest it has ever been on earth since human presence. The dangers of climate change are known since the 1980s but a lack of will and societal awareness has inhibited the necessary vigorous

Dear Friend, We at the High Atlas Foundation (HAF) wish you a happy end of year and a fulfilling year ahead This Newsletter is an expression of our appreciation for the students from the University of Virginia (UVA) and elsewhere who spent the last two summers with us and will hopefully join us for summers