From 2018 to 2020, SALAR International supported the municipality of El Mourouj with urban development support based on the SymbioCity Approach. The support targeted strategically placed politicians and civil servants to increase their awareness and provide new tools with methodologies in order to help improve the local urban environment.

You can really consider this to be the result of the capacitation the SymbioCity Approach provided, says Chiraz Gafsia, previously local urban expert at SALAR International and currently Project Manager at UN Habitat.

The working group planting trees.

Maher Hadhri was one of the members of the SymbioCity working group who took the knowledge to heart. After the project he began advocating for a greener and more sustainable environment. Later he was elected mayor of the municipality. But it did not stop there, he then contacted Chiraz and together they carried the SymbioCity work further and are now realizing the parc project and informing people on how to make it sustainable with help from UN Habitat funding.

It’s such a joy to see youth from civil society engaged in cleaning up the park. The municipality has mobilized plenty of workers and we have planted 90 trees and plants, but we still need additional funding to complete the whole project. I don’t like things unfinished so I won’t give up until we are done here, says Chiraz.