By Aleksander Esmann HAF Intern The webinar “Faith and Climate: The Road to COP 28” took place on May 4, 2023, as a preparatory meeting for COP 28, the UN Climate Change Conference 2023 in Dubai. This session discussed the anticipated main topics of the conference including the role that faith organizations play and what

يوسف سيكو: متطوع بمؤسسة الاطلس الكبير     بالرغم من أن انبعاثات المغرب من الغازات الدفيئة يبقى متواضعا بالمقارنة مع عدة دول، فإن موقعه الجغرافي يجعله في وضعية هشة حيال التأثيرات السلبية للتغيرات المناخية (جفاف وفيضانات، وعدم انتظام التساقطات على مستوى المكان أو الزمان وكذا ندرة الموارد المائية…). وتزداد هذه الهشاشة استفحالا بسبب تنامي ظاهرة التصحر

By Yossef Ben-Meir HAF President  I am approaching my 30th year of being involved in Morocco’s sustainable development journey. As in all paths of life, there are surprises that arise in the roles we play and remarkable experiences that can come any day.  Receiving the Fes-Gate Trophy with 14 wonderful others this past week was

Transformational Development in Decentralized Renewable Energy in Morocco, Scoop world. Arabic: Cawalisse, 22 March 2022. French version By Yossef Ben-Meir Marrakech, Morocco What we know Renewable energy (RE) sources power transformational outcomes for community development projects from all sectors. To secure cross-cutting benefits, localized (or decentralized) RE initiatives need to embody the same essential feature

By Timo Reinitzer, HAF intern What is the proper response to climate change? We all know that climate change is going to have an immense impact on our ecosystem, especially on water distribution. The question is rather what those will be and how to migite them. Africa will particularly face severe water shortages. As Professor

Bobby McDonough HAF-UVA Intern As the COVID-19 pandemic maintains its position as the international community’s chief issue to battle , its far-reaching effects can be felt particularly in poorer, marginalized communities. One obstacle that continues to grow in relevance is the subject of food security—the state of having reliable access to a sufficient quantity of

By Lahcen Ben Moula Tree Monitor Officer, Oujda Region High Atlas Foundation Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir, President of the High Atlas Foundation, organized an applied workshop on the participatory approach and its role in achieving sustainable development with the local population, during the second day of the training week organized by the High Atlas Foundation in

By Gabrielle Rosario HAF-UVA Intern Ten years ago, the Movement on Road 96, an environmental and social group of locals from Imider, Morocco, began a protest against the Société Métallurgique d’Imiter (SMI) by shutting off a water valve that previously diverted water from the mountain reservoir towards flushing a silver mine. For decades, the silver

By Moulay Hassan Aladlouni Country Director, HAF-F2F Program The High Atlas Foundation’s Farmer-to-Farmer (F2F) team met the members of the Adfal Association in a very remote mountain area. During the trip, the team had to unexpectedly leave the car and walk for 1.5 hours to Timichi village, which sits at an altitude of 1,920 meters,

بقلم فاطمة المريني     تمكنت مؤسسة الاطلس الكبير الرائدة الغنية عن التعريف تحت إدارة وتسيير الدكتور يوسف بن مير من ابرام شراكة مهمة ومتينة مع خدمة الغابات الأمريكية ، بغية بناء مجتمع من مسؤولي المشاريع  والفاعلين المؤثرين ، من خلال إنشاء برنامج غني بالموارد البشرية المتمكنة ذات خبرة عالية في المجال ومختصين محترفين يجعلون

Catrin Waters, UVA Intern Environmental Peacebuilding and the High Atlas Foundation partnered this past Tuesday, September 14th to present a talk featuring HAF’s president, Yossef Ben-Meir, as the main panelist. Environmental peacebuilding refers to the process by which conflict prevention and community resilience are aided by the management of natural resources. The organization presented a

Gabrielle Rosario We are in a climate crisis. Yet, the impacts of climate change will disproportionately harm marginalized communities, and in the Middle East, increasing surface temperatures and frequent droughts harm vulnerable populations. In fact, the Middle East warms at twice the global average, leaving cities uninhabitable and increasing the risk for heat-related illnesses. Increasingly,

By Sanae Benaadim HAF Office Manager and Volunteer Coordinator HAF volunteers on a field trip. Have you ever thought about volunteering and would like to be a volunteer at the High Atlas Foundation? If yes, you may wonder who you will reach. My name is Sanae Benaadim, and I am HAF’s Office Manager and Volunteer

By Hanane Ait Yamine, HAF Volunteer Celebrating global leadership in urban and community forestry Urban forests help define a sense of place and well-being where people live, work, play, and learn. The Tree Cities of the World program is an international effort to recognize cities and towns committed to ensuring that their urban forests and trees are

Samirah Jaigirdar HAF Director of Projects Amina El Hajjami discusses goals and assesses needs with cooperative members in Tisfan, Taroudant province. In 2015, world leaders met in a landmark conference of the UN to craft concrete goals to end poverty, stop environmental destruction and boost well-being. These pledges transformed into the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),

By Hajiba Boumasmar, HAF Program Coordinator Our country is full of history and cultures that connect between two communities, those of Moroccan Muslims and Moroccan Jews. We work together, constantly trying to preserve our culture so that it is not lost to new developments the world over. I want to share my experience at the

By Marij W Janjua, HAF UT-Austin Intern “Political freedom alone is still not enough if you lack clean water. Freedom alone is not enough without light to read at night, without time or access to water to irrigate your farm, without the ability to catch fish to feed your family. For this reason, the struggle

By Jasiah Hasan, HAF-UVa Intern On July 19, 2021, LEAP4FNSSA hosted a webinar event to share and emphasize the importance of collaboration between the African Union and the European Union. The event focused specifically on collaborations regarding agricultural innovations and food and nutrition security. LEAP4FNSSA is a project dedicated to supporting the implementation of long-term

By Said Bennani, HAF Project Manager and HAF Team HAF Project Manager Said Bennani, Driver Abdelghani Kastih, and volunteer Youssef Tahri, all visited the Tadmamt and Akrich nurseries on June 3, 2021, to start off an insightful visit and viewing of the communities. The first stop was in Tadmamt, where they met assistant nursery caretaker

Profound Partnerships: FRÉ Skincare and the High Atlas Foundation, Maravi Post. Zuha Afzal | 2021 HAF-UVA Intern Abstract The High Atlas Foundation (HAF) is an international development organization based in Morocco whose mission is to promote sustainable development. By supporting and empowering local communities on capacity building, clean water initiatives, pro bono legal aid, youth

By Kristin O’Donoghue HAF-UVA Intern In “Empowering Rural Participation and Partnerships in Morocco’s Sustainable Development,” Dr. Ben-Meir defines Morocco’s goal as to “utilize participatory approaches to achieve projects that are sustainable and that measurably enhance the standard of living, knowledge, longevity, and engagement in society.” Participatory development allows community beneficiaries to occupy a central position

By Karam-Yane Azzabi, Program Coordinator The HAF team visits Tighmert Oasis to meet farmers who benefited from the Afous Ghissiki project and planted trees with HAF in 2021. It was with great excitement that I hit the road to Sidi Ifni accompanied by Abdeljalil Ait Ali, HAF Field Manager, and Mustapha Id Said, HAF Driver

Webster Hill HAF-UVa Intern The terrain of Morocco provides the opportunity to achieve tremendous agricultural and environmental results. The High Atlas Foundation (HAF) plants fruit trees across the country with rural communities. In 2021, HAF-community collaboration has planted 700,000 trees of nine fruit varieties, with 6,000 farming families in 39 provinces. In addition, 1.6 million

بقلم يوسف الطاهري : متطوع بمؤسسة الأطلس الكبير تنقل فريق مؤسسة الأطلس الكبير الى جماعة توبقال عبر مضايق تيشكا مرورا بمنطقة اكويم وتيديلي، بقيادة مديرة المشاريع بالَمؤسسة السيدة أمينة الحجامي ومساعدتها السيدة صفاء بن كروم، و متطوعة من الديار السلوفينية السيدة سيمونا زوبنز بتاريخ 25 ماي 2021 قرية أكرزران الجبلية  :لقاء تعاونية اكرزران النسائية  بين

People’s Participation Decides the World’s Environment, Al Bawaba. • Arabic: Cawalisse, 04 June 2021. By Yossef Ben-Meir Marrakech The fruit tree nursery management by the Takherkhourt Women’s Cooperative in the Marrakech region of Morocco (High Atlas Foundation, 2021). Recognizing this week’s World Environment Day reminds us of the evolution of the concept of sustainable development since

Tahi Wiggins Student, University of Virginia For all the attention given to service-learning, the concept is extremely broad and can include an enormous diversity of experiences. I am passionate about the essentiality of service learning and have sought out several such experiences. In this article, I will compare three of my own service-learning experiences, analyzing

Sanae Benaadim HAF’s Office Manager & Volunteer Coordinator Students from the University of Pennsylvania’s International Impact visiting with the fruit tree nursery of the Takhrkhourt Women’s Cooperative in Asni municipality of the Al Haouz province. On May 18th, I travelled from Marrakech with the HAF President, Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir, Project Assistants Lahcen Ait Ouatouch and

Nicole Luz HAF-UVa Intern When people speak of the protection and upliftment of children, those in juvenile detention are often forgotten. In Morocco, children between the ages of 12 and 18 who have committed a transgression of the law are often housed in Child Protection Centers (CPCs). Children who were abandoned, had to be removed

– Empowering Women to Combat Climate Change, Morocco World News. Shivani Lakshman Charlottesville, Virginia Climate change is likely the most urgent crisis facing us in the 21st century. Rising temperatures are causing increasingly frequent and severe natural disasters, more droughts and heat waves, precipitation changes, and sea level rise. Consequently, this is leading to high

تشبتا بمبادئها التنموية، ولزرع قيم الثقافة البيئية والتنمية المستدامة، أشرفت إدارة مؤسسة الأطلس الكبير بمعية شركائها الأوفياء، شركة سيمانس كاميزا للطاقات المتجددة (SGRENe)، بتوزيع وغرس شتلات الأشجار المثمرة بإقليم بوجدور نزولا عند رغبات الساكنة، مع مراعاة مبدأ المقاربة التشخيصية التشاركية، وتفعيلا لشراكة مؤسسة الأطلس الكبير وشركة سيمانس كاميزا للطاقات المتجددة، انتقل طاقم المؤسسة جنوبا ممثلا