Sidi Kaouki Local initiative meeting documentation

Today @matthias and I meet one of the leaders of the Sid Kaouki local initiative / association. It was a nice meet up and we got to know what are the main concerns of the local initiative here and this showed up some different ways to cooperate. Their main fields of work are the garbage problem, the school, and some surf club activities.

The initiative is formed from 11 Sidi Kaouki Residents as an organizational core group.

1. Garbage collection problem

Now it is confirmed that there is no proper wast management system in Sidi Kaouki, there is only one big “container” on the road that was put there, with initial plans or unclear plans of collecting the garbage from there to be dumped in Essaouira or nearby cities, but this never happens. There is no company that collects the garbage from Kaouki, Also there is no public bins for obvious reasons. The initiative organizes some beach clean-up days and then collect all plastics and burn it. This is the used solution so far.

Ideas some are already here in the dynalist but initially participate in the beach clean up to get to know the active people in kaouki and help cleaning the beach. others like precious plastic workshop or beach cleaning robots are valid ways to go for.

The situation is not extreme, it could be easily solved, It is worth mentioning that the use of plastic bags is reduced in Kaouki and nearby areas, Super market reduced the plastic bags usage.

2. School situation

  • The nearby school is 2-3 km away from Sidi kaouki, It serves Sidi Kaouki and nearby villages.

  • Number of students is around 63, ranging from 6 to 14 years old, with 3 teachers

  • We didn’t see the school yet, but reportedly it is not in good shape, it needs some to be repaired. another organization from Casablanca is coming on the 21st of January to provide some repairs including windows, doors, ceiling and some paint. ( when it rains for example there is no school day as the roof can’t manage the rain ) . By March they will provide some bicycles for the kids to be able to reach the school.

Ideas initially what could be done is furniture ( @m_tantawy may be this could be the first furniture set Bitcut produces ) others to be discussed if someone is interested in any educational activities or workshops for kids ( @HadeerGhareeb ) the school is the way to go.

3. Surf Club

Some of the association members are working in surfing, so the direct connection would be to work together on the surf boards project.
on a side note, bamboo is being planted here and could be bought from Essaouira so we can experiment with bamboo surfboards @Sofien-Dahem @Maatoug
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بعضا من اعضاء المبادرة المحلية فى سيدى كاوكى يعملون فى "سيرف كلوب " و ممكن ان نتواصل معهم فى فى مشروع الالواح …ايضا البامبو متوفر فى الصويرة و يمكننا تجربته فى صناعة الالواح
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This is another way we could explore to concretize the ecological idea of the surfboard ,what they did is merly a start we could do much more especially on the aetethical part on top of that the impact on the environment is much bigger since we’ll be handling the garbage matter plastic bottels more specifically of the region :wink:

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Great idea. Let’s see what Mohamed thinks…

Also, based on the dynalist: sign me up for the beach cleanup initiative. Great idea. Is it easy to rent or commandeer a vehicle for taking the collected trash to Essa?

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It should be quite easy and affordable, yes. I was also thinking to just fill that large trash container and then pay whoever put it there to empty it in Gazhoua / Essaouira:

Do you take it to a landfill?

Yes, to a landfill (but an official one). That is so far the only option around here.