A handful of members of the Gard association will go to Africa to provide help to people in need.
After a cultural evening that attracted more than 200 people to Prolé on October 18, it was decided that eight members of SOCOOP Solidarity and International Cooperation will leave for Senegal in November. Five of them will leave the country by car on November 11 for a long journey of around ten days. The cars will be loaded with all kinds of materials that are difficult to find locally. Three other speakers will join them by plane on November 25, 2024. This team will stay for around ten days in Mlomp Kassa, in the south of Senegal where they will be accommodated in the association's premises made available by the host municipality, then at the Koukangoumé center managed by a congregation. Members will take the opportunity to meet the municipal team as well as the residents of the town.
SOCOOP will continue the actions undertaken in the municipality last year and will take charge of the overhaul of two solar pumps in the vegetable gardens, in the community garden and in an elementary school. In the “toddlers’ hut” (nursery school), they will evaluate the work on the roof and then renovate the blackboards. The members plan to connect this school to the electricity network and ensure its installation. Computer awareness training is also planned by SOCOOP volunteers in conjunction with the municipality in the digital space installed last year.
Interventions and film screenings will be provided in various schools. A communal fireplace or a large screen will be permanently installed. At the dispensary and maternity ward, in addition to donations of blankets and clothes for the little ones, a nurse and a physiotherapist will initiate an exchange of experience with the aim of measuring the material needs of the healthcare team.
A major reforestation program was launched this year in the town of Mlomp by SOCOOP Solidarity and International Cooperation. More than 2,000 fruit trees have already been planted among residents of the town. In addition to providing shade, they will help combat even more significant global warming in tropical areas. They will also produce fruits which will contribute to the food subsistence and economic autonomy of the inhabitants. These two factors will make it possible to stem the exodus of the population. In addition, volunteers will plant more than 150 trees in schoolyards and will thus raise environmental awareness in conjunction with the Senegalese forest service.
