Timidouwa and Tagaste, a franco-tuareg friendship

A French association becomes Tagaste’s voice in France

The association Timidouwa Amitié Niger (Niger Friendship) is a young association, created in July 2006 by four friends, Mathilde, Cécile, Julie and Mathilde, after one of them traveled to Niger in 2005 and met the members NGO Tagaste and the tuareg communities of the Azawak Valley.
The association’s objectives are to be the representative of NGO Tagaste in France and to bring a financial support to its projects, starting with Fak school project. The association will also work to promote Niger, the tuareg culture, etc…

Timidouwa will be present at the « Marché solidaire » (the Solidarity Market) that will take place in the 13th arrondissement of Paris, France, on October 18 2006 during the International Solidarity Week.

If you wish to contact Timidouwa :
- E-mail : assotimidouwa@yahoo.fr
- Phone : Mathilde B. : 06 76 17 36 43
Cécile : 01 34 77 00 56
Mathilde C. : 01 45 88 53 79
Julie : 06 17 18 67 48

The association’s office is located in Mantes-la-Ville (Yvelines), France
Address: 15, rue Camélinat, 78 711 Mantes la Ville, France

Sunflower Children and NGO Tagaste, working together to develop the Fak community

Sunflower Children, a non-profit foundation headed by Czech fashion model Helena Houdova and based in New York City, is partnering with NGO Tagaste in order to raise funds to develop the community of Fak, a community of nomadic stockbreeders in the Northeast of Niger.

Sunflower Children is providing their non-profit status and their online donation tool to help raise funds in order to reopen the school of Fak, rehabilitate the well and create a cereal bank for the community.

Sunflower believes that education is the key to a better life for disadvantaged children. Accordingly, Sunflower focuses on providing vital support - including healthcare, nutritional and other basic needs - that enable children in Sunflower Project communities to pursue educational growth.

To learn more about the Fak project, and if you wish to make a donation, please visit the Sunflower website:
http://www.sunflower.org/pro_nig.htm

October 5th: New York fundraiser for the school of Fak

Once again, our friends in New York are mobilizing to help us achieve our goal: to reopen the school of Fak.





Jiri Boudnik, our NGO representative in New York, and Sabine Scheckel, a New York based photographer, in association with the non-profit foundation Sunflower Children, are organizing a fundraising event on October 5th.

Please join us on October 5th in New York for an evening of sahelian music, drinks and great food.

Where: Above Fanelli's
94 Prince street, 2nd floor
(corner of Mercer street)

Life music from Niger: Abdoulaye Alhassane will play typical desert music

Art auction (from 6-10PM)
Sabine Scheckel will auction off her pictures from Niger (www.sabinescheckel.com)
Jiri Boudnik will auction off some of his paintings (http://jiriboudnik.blogspot.com)

Silver Tuareg jewelry from Niger will be on sale.

Appetizers courtesy of Chef John Light www.johnlightcatering.com
Drinks courtesy of Pilsner Urquell and Glacier Vodka

Suggested donation: $20 at the door

www.sunflowerchildren.org
http://www.sunflowerchildren.org/pro_nig.htm

The school of Fak will open its doors

The Tagaste team has secured a schoolteacher for the school of Fak with the Nigerien academic inspection of Abalak.

The school should open at the end of October, and allow the 25 children of the community to resume their basic education.

In the next few weeks, the Tagaste team will have a meeting with the community leader of Fak, purchase the food supplies for the school, replenish their didactical materials and set everything in place for the arrival of the schoolteacher.

Coming soon…
Stay tuned for some great videos of the school reopening!

NGO Tagaste and The Nomad Foundation: a possible partnership

On September 12, in the mud city of Agadez, at the doors of the great Sahara desert, Youssouf and Ingrid of NGO Tagaste, had a meeting with Leslie Clark and Sidi Mohamed Mamane Illo, from the Nomad Foundation.

Leslie Clark, founder of the Nomad Foundation, is an artist whose career has always incuded travel.

The Nomad Foundation is dedicated to the preservation of artistic and cultural traditions. Helping people support themselves using skills they already possess. Starting with cultural exchanges bringing African musicians to the US to increase awareness of the beauty of the music and art forms. The foundation has always tried to work with the local population to decide what it is they need and want to improve their lives. Today the projects include nomadic schools, wells, women's co-operatives, microcredit, cereal banks, health and nutritional issues for people and animals.

Sidi Mamane is the Nomad Foundation representative in Niger. He is the elected councillor for the Ingall region which is the most important region of nomadic people. He is the director of Nomad Expeditions, the Niger arm of Nomad Adventures and a founding member and president of the Agadez Rotary Club.

Talks turned around the general situation of the Fulani and Tuareg nomads of Niger and specific projects of both structures were discussed.

NGO Tagaste and the Nomad Foundation are considering a partnership to develop the commercialization of sheep by the women’s groups of the village of Tamaya.

Please visit The Nomad Foundation's website:

http://www.nomadfoundation.org/

Tamaya is mobilizing against plastic waste

NGO Tagaste is starting a media campaign against the plastic refuse that is plaguing the village of Tamaya.

The first stage of the campaign will be a series of radio programs aiming at heightening the villagers’ awareness of the dangers of plastic waste for the environment, the animals and the population.

The radio programs, designed and produced by Youssouf from NGO Tagaste, will air on the Tamaya community radio airwaves and reach people in a radius of 30 km around the village.

The first radio program will be recorded next week in the facilities of the Tamaya community radio and will air immediately.

Youssouf and Ingrid have already started the campaign with a test on the children of Youssouf’s nomadic camp. Through play activities they have taught the children to pick up the plastic waste left behind by the camp. The test has proven to be positive: the children are now picking up plastic everyday and bring it, first thing in the morning, to Ingrid.

The second stage of the campaign will be to put in place a cleaning team that will pick up, store and properly dispose of the plastic waste.

NGO Tagaste is looking for partners in order to execute the second stage of the plastic waste project.

Coming soon…
Stay tuned for some great video of the children of the camp cleaning up plastic waste
and… the recording of the first radio program of the plastic refuse campaign