Women’s Marketplace
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.
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