Women’s Marketplace

Women's Initiative Gambia

Empowering Women
in The Gambia

In the heart of The Gambia, a pioneering
women's marketplace is making significant
strides for a brighter future.

This vibrant marketplace, run by a collective
of local innovative women, emphasizes the reduction and reuse of waste as its core mission.
By transforming discarded materials into valuable products, the marketplace not only addresses the pressing issue of waste management but also empowers local women through sustainable economic opportunities. Through their creative efforts, these women are crafting a greener future for The Gambia, showcasing the powerful impact of community-driven environmental initiatives.

Women's Initiative Gambia

Women’s Initiative Gambia (WIG) began as a small, environmental enterprise. Isatou Ceesay and collaborators began recycling discarded plastic bags through crochet, taking trash and turning it into useful products, such as ladies’ bags, purses, balls, and wallets. As the endeavor grew more successful, they formed local women groups and trained the groups on processing waste plastic into long stripes which could then be woven into useful products. The women were able to sell these products, bringing in much-needed money, and at the same time helping reduce plastic waste in their community.

The initiative has since grown beyond plastic recycling to include other areas of recycling—such as briquette production from discarded groundnut and coconut shells and bag production from used rice bags—as well as teaching entrepreneurial skills and empowerment to women, youth and disabled groups. Today, hundreds of women, youth and disabled groups across the country are benefiting from WIG.

“I THINK THAT WHEN YOU ABUSE YOUR ENVIRONMENT, YOU ABUSE YOURSELF” 
-ISATOU CEESAY -

Fed up with The Gambia's mounting waste problem, Isatou Ceesay set up an initiative called 'One Plastic Bag'. It promotes recycling and provides women with additional income.

Finda Charles

Finda Charles was born in the Gorama Chiefdom in Sierra Leone’s diamond district . As a young girl, she fled her country’s eleven-year ‘Rebel” or so-called Blood Diamond War” finding refuge and a new life in the Gambia as a entrepurenuar and artist. Today, she is an accomplished beaituican, seamstress craftswoman contributing to her community by celebrating the shared history of West African artisanship.