HISG Strengthens Relationships with Partners in North Africa

Tie-dying clothing
Malta, Mauritania, Morocco, Jan 01, 2006

MALTA AND WEST AFRICA, 2006-- In January, the HISG team attended a conference in Malta aimed at uniting delegates from neighboring nations.  Representatives from Morocco, Mauritania, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya met to report on the state of their nations and the needs of their citizens, an ideal forum for pursuing friendships and formulating bonds for future humanitarian aid work in North Africa.

From Malta, two HISG team members traveled to Nouakchott, Mauritania to work with an NGO whose mission is to “value underprivileged people and contribute to their growth.”  Our host introduced us to several worthy projects.  We visited a women’s literacy center, a boys’ juvenile detention center, many small businesses launched on $300 loans, a women’s sewing cooperative, and the planned site of an urban development project.

We were moved by the widespread poverty and malnutrition throughout the area.  AIDS and TB are rampant; famine and drought are the norm.  Single-parent mothering is common in Mauritania where divorce occurs in 95% of all marriages.  We met and talked with a single mother of five young children.  To provide for her family, she tie-dyes clothing to sell in her small store which she shares with four other women.

The team traveled to Casablanca, Meknes and Rabat, Morocco.  We explored funding possibilities for a shelter for abandoned children, a proposed home for unmarried women with newborns, and a rehabilitation center for handicapped children and their mothers.  In Sale’ outside of Rabat, we met a woman inspired by her dream to build a community center that would focus on teaching the arts, literacy and basic work skills.





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