By Salim Syassi HAF Intern and Student at Al Akhawayn University Anamer and Aghbalou may seem to be two typical villages in the mountainous Al Haouz province of Morocco, but they embody exceptional efforts of participatory development led by the High Atlas Foundation (HAF), local communities, and the High Commission of Waters and Forests. As

By Aichatou Haidara Aanya Salot HAF Interns On the 24th of May, the office of the High Atlas was brimming with a total of 91 people as the High Atlas Foundation staff and the people of Marrakech’s Mellah gathered for Iftar, the breaking of fast. Marrakech’s Mellah proves to be a religious and geographical testimony to the historic

The women of the Ourika commune and HAF Project Manager Amina El Hajjami (second from left) By Katie O’Neill, HAF Intern from Claremont McKenna College (USA) High Atlas Foundation, Marrakech In the village commune of Ourika, Morocco a women’s cooperative successfully cultivates vast fields of calendula flowers. Though in this part of the world patriarchal

By Julia Payne HAF Intern On Monday June 4, 2018, we took the snaking roads through the High Atlas Mountains to the Tassa Ouirgane community nestled between two towering mountains in the Toubkal National Park. The purpose of the day’s visit was to have the community participate in a training workshop on how to manage

By Julia Al-Akkad HAF Intern The High Atlas Foundation’s initiation of Sami’s Project in 2011 led to remarkable success throughout the rural communities of the Kingdom of  Morocco. The sustainable development project seeks to improve the education system by creating green spaces through distributing and planting trees at local schools. The green spaces encourage the

Implementing the U.N.’s Sustainable Development Goals After fifteen years of nations pursuing the Millennium Development Goals established by the United Nations, representatives of the member states, along with experts and private citizens, have defined Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to help set the course for the next fifteen years.   All told seventeen goals have been

June 23, 2015 Marrakesh, Morocco The High Atlas Foundation (HAF) recently participated in the only Moroccan festival solely dedicated to the celebration of walnuts and almonds. At the festival this year, held June 12-14, HAF showcased its organic certified walnut oils and packaged nuts produced at the walnut processing facility, located just up the street

We are in the final stages of establishing the organic agricultural value chain for HA3!  This begins with community tree nurseries and culminates in certified product – walnuts and almonds initially – entering the global market place. Here’s what it looks like: It’s an incredible achievement on the part of HAF-HA3 to have developed to

Green Sahara Furniture (GSF), based in Casablanca, Morocco, designs and builds unique, handcrafted, and sustainable furniture and wood decor items.  They use natural wood shapes and reclaimed pieces from pruned and fallen trees in many of our projects and they partner with the High Atlas Foundation regarding tree planting, irrigation, and other community development projects

By Hana Ezaoui HAF Program Manager, Boujdour Province Sewing tents is an important activity for the Sahrawi people and is seen as spiritual when considering the strong relationship between Sahrawis and the tent. It represents their traditions and their cultural heritage. It also refers to joy, celebration, and happiness. Sahrawi people who see a tent

Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir on Human Development in the Arab Spring Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir answers questions on his recently-completed essay entitled Human Development in the Arab Spring: An Analysis of Past Development and Today’s Morocco toward Shaping a Global Future. Dr. Ben-Meir has been dedicated to the field of international development since he joined the Peace

The Federation of Civil Society Associations of Ourika includes seven associations.  We at HAF appreciate their dedication and so we would like to mention them individually: • Afoulki Association for Development • Association Noor for Development • Association Asrou for Development • Association Fam Lhari • Association Koji for Solidarity and Development • Tifawin Association

Morocco is being lauded today as a bastion of stability in a troubled time and region; while the future is unforeseeable, there are certainly specific factors that have helped bring about this significant situation. Three in particular are well known: the kingdom’s participatory efforts to promote human development; its process of decentralization of power; and

– Mountain Life, Addis Fortune, 14 December 2014. It may be that, more than any other terrain, mountain regions exemplify a particular paradox – that of dense poverty coexisting with a special potential for transformative prosperity. The conditions that create mountain people’s impoverishment are rooted both in local and broader contextual conditions.  Mountain areas are often blessed

  An In-Hand and Far-Out Achievement for 2015  A Letter from HAF’s President Veuillez cliquer ici pour la version française الرجاء الضغط هنا للحصول على النسخة العربية Dear Friends, From all of us at the High Atlas Foundation, we extend best wishes for health and all good things. Morocco’s model for human development creates enormous possibility for our participatory approach and organic agricultural

Give to the High Atlas Foundation, Now More than Ever The future is incredible when we look at the many municipalities in Morocco where HAF-HA3 can help organic certify and sell their agricultural product globally – for their transformational benefit. Net revenue from organic sales are dividends for marginalized farming families, and fund the people’s priority projects

Fatima Baamrani HAF Project Manager, Taroudant Province I arrived at ten o’clock at “Lycee College Tifnout” in the village of Amzerko, of the High Atlas Toubkal municipality, together with Aisha Amazal (HAF community facilitator), Khadija Himmi (tree nursery supporter) and Mahjoub Imgdouin from the Parents Association. In the beginning, Abd Aziz Fidoum, the director of

Morocco, El Haouz province: 60 thousand fruit trees to be planted and distributed at Jewish sacred site as part of High Atlas Foundation ‘One Billion Tree Campaign‘. At midday on Monday February 9th, 2015 the honorable governor of the province of El Haouz, Mr Younès El Bathaoui, together with local community members and representatives of

– Meet 2015er: Yossef Ben-Meir, U.N. Dispatch, Mythili Sampath Kumar (staff writer), 18 February 2015. This blog post is taken from an article written by Mythili Sampathkumar and published on February 18, 2015 for UN Dispatch. This is the second installment of our new “Meet a 2015er” series that profiles the women and men who are helping to

Morocco, El Haouz Province: House of Life – Intercultural Organic Tree Nursery Initiative Monday, February 9th, 2015 saw the nationwide launch of an intercultural organic agriculture initiative as the honorable Governor of El Haouz, Mr Younès El Bathaoui, presided over a very special fruit tree distribution and planting ceremony at a Jewish sacred site.  In

On February 25, I attended on behalf of the High Atlas Foundation (HAF) the “High-Level Debate on Integrating Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice in the Post-2015 Development Agenda” with the United Nations Trusteeship Council in New York City. A full-day event, the debate featured multiple panels and interventions by the Moroccan delegacy. This debate opened

What development vividly means: A report about my Internship at the High Atlas Foundation by Till Dahlmüller Marrakesh, Morocco Mid February 2015 I set off for ten days in the High Atlas Mountains, an undertaking that was in keeping with the terms of my Internship at the High Atlas Foundation (HAF) in Marrakesh. It was these

Written by Amina Elhajjami, the High Atlas Foundation’s Program Director for the Al Haouz and Taroudant provinces along with National Endowment for Democracy projects in this region, her story gives a glimpse of life in a village of the High Atlas mountains, where women’s associations are beginning to thrive and are supported by men in

The High Atlas Foundation (HAF) attended the fifty-ninth session of the Commission on the Status of Women at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City in March. HAF’S representative, Mary Sloan, shares her experience below. Last week I attended the 59th Session of the United Nations’ Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) as a

On a Saturday last March, the Teachers Association of Life Sciences and the Earth, partnering with the High Atlas Foundation, completed planting 110 Argon, carob and olive trees with students at the Sidi Bouskri School in Smimou, Essaouira. With the support of the PaperSeed Foundation and the Embassy of Switzerland, Rabat, this project is also planting

أولت مؤسسة الأطلس الكبير اهتماما كبيرا بقطاع التعليم، لما  يلعبه من دور في المساهمة في  التنمية البشرية والمستدامة،خاصة الاهتمام بمجال البيئة إن المحافظة على البيئة من أهم العوامل التي تعتمد عليها التربية، والمساهمة في تكوين شخصية التلاميذ و مجال لتطوير إبداعاتهم و مهاراتهم.لدى فالمؤسسة تعمل جاهدة على تطوير “مشروع سامي” الهادف إلى تشجير المدارس و

Training on the Relationship between Associations and Media Rabat, Morocco HAF Office Manager Fatima Zahra Laaribi and Program Director for the Al Haouz and Taroudant provinces Amina Al Hajjami attended a training workshop in Rabat organized by Search for Common Ground (SFCG) on the relationship between Associations and Media along with eight associations: (Tadamoune, En-Nakhil, Amal, Women’s

By Safae Lacheheb Safae Lacheheb reflects on her month-long spring fellowship in Washington D.C. working with Serve DC, a service organization dedicated to community engagement. Safae’s fellowship was made possible through Legacy International’s Professional Fellows Program. I spent the majority of my fellowship journey in the District of Columbia, where I was assigned by Legacy

As part of its mission, the High Atlas Foundation protects and preserves the environment for all the people. Every fall and spring we plant hundreds of trees at schools across Morocco in which Sami’s project – inspired by Sami, a young environmental enthusiast – connects students to the benefit of trees and promotes environmental sustainability. On the morning of

It was well past nine by the time we rumbled through the city to pick up Abderrahim. The streets of the medina were only just waking up from their Sunday morning snooze, but HAF’s Project Manager had been up since six. He hopped in the front seat of the taxi, passing back loaves of warm