This is a post dedicated to the ‘Queen of recycling’, Isatou Ceesay – A Gambian activist and social entrepreneur. I hope you enjoy learning about her. There are some resources at the bottom of this post where you can continue to learn more.
We humans are every bit a part of nature as our fellow fauna, but we often think and behave as though we are not. As we walk the earth, our actions have impacts and it’s up to us to make sure most of those impacts are positive.
In the Humans section of Tellurian Treasures, I celebrate those who embody the characteristics of what I would call a true ‘earthling’. These are the people who nurture and respect their connection to the natural world. They are careful to tread lightly on the earth, while developing their knowledge of the intricacies of nature. They then share this knowledge with others, creating a valuable legacy that we can all live by and look up to.
Who is Isatou Ceesay?
Isatou Ceesay earned her epithet, ‘Queen of recycling’ through her creative efforts to tackle the issues of plastic waste in The Gambia. She was inspired to take action after witnessing the increasing amounts of rubbish piling up outside her village.
The problem was only getting worse and other than just looking ugly, the waste piles were causing other issues in her community. In particular, plastic waste was being ingested by goats, causing many of them to die suddenly. Butchers would find plastic in their stomachs. Rain water would also collect in pools on top of the waste piles, encouraging mosquitos to breed, leading to malaria outbreaks. Even the soil had become polluted with plastic, inhibiting the ability of food crops to grow.
The piling up of waste had gotten out of control and with no infrastructure to recycle, it would just continue to build up. The plastic waste was now causing now a health crisis in an already poverty stricken community.
Isatou had noticed a change in the way villagers would carry shopping back from the market. Instead of using baskets, many people now used plastic bags instead. She saw this as an opportunity to upcycle discarded plastic bags into new sellable products rather than allowing them to simply add to the rubbish piles around the village.
Isatou had always been good at making things. She grew up on her parents farm with her siblings. She would often use scrap pieces of wood and cloth to make dolls and toys for her friends. Isatou’s sister had taught her to croquet and it was her croquet skills that enabled her to turn plastic bags into purses and bags that could be sold for money.
Isatou, along with four friends, formed a women’s group where they would sit together and make pretty accessories out of plastic bags. They collected the plastic bags from rubbish piles, cleaned them and dried them out. Then they cut each bag into a long threads of plastic yarn that they would crochet into small purses. They used different coloured bags to create colourful patterns. Each purse took around eight hours or more to make and used up about 10 plastic bags.
At first, Isatou and her friends didn’t have much support from the other villagers. They were thought of a dirty for digging around in the rubbish piles to collect the plastic bags. Their meetings were also frowned upon by men in the village who didn’t approve of women working – that was a man’s job. But Isatou had a strong sense of belief in what she was doing and so despite the snares and judgments from others, she, along with her friends, continued to make the purses in secret. They would gather in Isatou’s home at night to make the purses and after months of work, Isatou took them to market in the city. To her delight, she sold every single one!
Isatou’s idea had turned into a small business venture and her entrepreneurial spirit has since helped to empower many women through providing them with the means and support to generate an income. Isatou’s community recycling project had grown to 50 women in a year and she named it the N’jau Recycling and Income Generation Group (NRIGG). As a result, women in her village have been able to generate enough money to keep their daughters in school. Their income has meant they can also afford medical treatment when needed.
But Isatou didn’t stop there. Isatou and her friends have used some of their income to fund a community vegetable garden, which raises money to send orphaned children to school.
Isatou started working as a language and culture helper with the Peace Corps in 2000 and this enabled her to secure funding in order to build a skills and education centre in N’jau. Here, the women could meet and work together. The center provided a space for the women to learn about the importance of caring for their environment. Many of the villagers had been burning plastic for fuel for cooking, so the center provided education around the dangers of doing this. Isatou taught classes on subjects such as gardening, soap making and tie-dying, which meant the women could make many things to sell. Isatou is also knowledgeable about nutrition and so gave cooking demonstrations on how to prepare nutritious meals to keep their families healthy.
The NRIGG has grown to the point where their crafts are even being sold intonationally. They’ve even branched out and looked at other ways they can use other waste products, such as turning food waste into compost to grow food and making jewelry out of tyres.
Remarkably, the women eventually ran out of plastic waste in N’jau to make their crafts, so they went to other nearby villages to use the waste from there. As a result, they have shared their knowledge about recycling with even more people.
In 2009 Isatou got a job working for Future In Our Hands, a Swedish not-for-profoit. This provided her with the opportunity to work with a wider range of communities through The Gambia.
Isatou has deservingly won an award and earned recognition for her work and contributions to environmentalism. She won The international Alliance for Women ‘Difference Maker‘ award in 2012. Her story has also been published in a book called ‘One Plastic Bag’ authored by Miranda Paul and Illustrated by Elizabeth Zunon.
Find out more about Isatou Ceesay
Visit oneplasticbag.com to learn more about Isatou Ceesay and her work.
Visit gambiahelp.org to learn more about the Gambia Health Education Liaison Project, also known as GambiaHELP. A project with the mission of enabling communities in the Gambia to protect, conserve and improve their health, the health of their community, and their natural environment.
You may also be able to purchase the purses made by the women of N’jau here (if they are in stock.)
Articles
The Guardian – How a small African recycling project tackles a mountainous rubbish problem – 2014
Books
Thank you for reading. Have a beautiful day.
~ Faine
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