Selection Tunisia

Dasri Sterile

Our project ‘Ecological Complex Tunisie Vert Emeraude’ will be a leader at the national and continental level in the field of management of solid and liquid hazardous waste.
This environmental complex consists of 4 independent but complementary projects:

1. Waste treatment center for infectious risk healthcare activities (DASRI)
2. Hazardous Liquid Waste Treatment Center
3. Center for processing expired pharmaceuticals
4. Training center for green professions and the creation of green jobs

By creating this ecological complex, we reflect an awareness that we are ‘the guardians of nature and not their owners’.

The Problem

The gender inequalities in the labour market in Tunisia convey the high rate of unemployment amongst women with higher education diplomas who are in the majority on university benches and yet are a minority in employment. Nearly two-thirds of unemployed university graduates university are women and out of a total of 223,000 registered unemployed graduates, 145,000 are women according to the National Institute of Statistics (INS) which is owing in part to familial strains such as taking care of children.

Furthermore, in Tunisia the waste management problem creates the following environmental problems:

  1. The treatment of waste from health care activities with infectious risks (DASRI): The demand is always greater than the supply since the quantity of DASRI generated annually in Tunisia is around 18,000 tons, while the treatment capacity of the 10 operating companies barely covers half, i.e. 9253 tonnes maximum per year.
  2. The treatment of liquid waste from medical analysis laboratories: There is no company operating in the sector to offset the disposal of liquid waste, while there are more than 700 laboratories alongside industrial companies producing cosmetics, paint and detergent industries
  3. The treatment of expired drugs: There has been no company specializing in the management of liquid medication which expires after 6 months, to which thereafter, pharmacies and drug manufacturing companies have surplus stocks of products and can no longer store them.

The Solution

Our project will be deployed in a rural area where approximately one hundred young unemployed graduates live. Given the industrial precariousness and the emphasis placed on the agricultural sector where the young female graduate finds themselves deprived of the right to work. Tunisie Vert Emeraude will offer hope for these young women to launch their careers with stable and permanent jobs without the need to leave their hometowns.
Due to familial responsibilities, we aim to establish a daycare centre to encourage mothers to benefit from their right to work while being reassured of the safety of their children.

We also offer the opportunity for young people to integrate into professional life by creating decent jobs and for others to move towards a very interesting sector which exists within green entrepreneurship via training in green trades and job creation.

Additionality

CYFE support is instrumental in starting the project as we would not be likely to progress at all due to the high-risk nature of the work alongside there being no established commercial case or available additional funding.

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