By Fatima Zahra Laaribi
The president of the High Atlas Foundation (HAF), Yossef Ben-Meir, and HAF´s Lead Women’s Empowerment Trainer, Fatima Zahra Laaribi, hold presentations at the UCL Faculty of Laws at the Bentham House in London, United Kingdom.

Two presentations about the work HAF does in Morocco and the methodologies it applies, including its participatory approach and its emphasis on gender development in Morocco were given to 20 students, two professors and two assistants at the University College London.
The first presentation was about fulfilling Morocco’s vision of local communities. The second one, “The Integration of Empowerment and Participatory Methodologies”, was about gender, empowerment, and development in Morocco.
The presentations had two purposes. First, they were intended to deepen the students’ understanding of HAF´s development work in Morocco. The students were given an overview of HAF´s mission and the participatory approach as a core principle of HAF´s work. On top of that, HAF’s methodology, particularly its approach to promoting gender equality, HAF´s biggest achievements and HAF´s various activities in 20 provinces of Morocco were presented.
Secondly, every student will get the opportunity to work on topics and projects covered in the presentation during their time in Morocco.

The following four projects were presented to the students to work on them during their time with High Atlas Foundation:

Tree Planting, Climate Change and Health:

The main purpose of this project is to study, analyze and present the impact of community-based tree planting and monitoring on human and environmental health, climate change mitigation, and reinvestment in sustainable development projects.

Water as a priority for Moroccan communities:

The objective of this project is to study challenges related to water in Morocco and their effects on health. Field coordinators from HAF will coordinate this activity in rural areas in the Taroudant province.

Gender and Health:

This project will deal with the questions of how health content specific to Moroccan women can be integrated into HAF´s methodology for gender empowerment and development and why and how the IMAGINE empowerment workshop is a necessary experience in order to achieve sustainable development.

Public spaces in Marrakech´s city center:

In the course of this project the quality of public spaces in Marrakech is analyzed in relation to climate change, health, and other factors.