EBDA in December 2022
Introducing the Economy of Love standard to USAID representatives
Justus Harm pitched the idea of Economy of Love to a global delegation of USAID representatives. The delegation, jointly organized by Land O’Lakes Venture37, visited the SEKEM farm, factories, and companies and witnessed the EoL standard’s inspiration.
EBDA Strategy Development Workshop
An intensive strategy workshop, aiming to align focus and forces for the next phase starting now. The focus of the next phase is to onboard at least 43,000 new farming members into the association. With Dr. Omar El-dahan, Business and education consultant who helped us with giving us tips and structions to improve and update the EBDA vision and mission of the association and how it needs to be updated regarding many aspects. He also let us put some main objectives as a setted goals for implementation.
Training about Soil Food Web
Organic Egypt Organized a 5-Days training for its partners Demeter Egypt (EBDA) and The Integral Development Action of Minia (IDAM) on Soil Food Web. The training was based on understanding the basics of the dynamic relationships between plants and the soil microbiome. This includes the soil microbiome’s role in nutrient cycling, the building of soil structure and successional selection. An outline of the practical process for applying this knowledge in the field was also provided, along with an intensive introduction to soil microscopy with hands-on practice. A new method for quickly assessing the makeup of the microbiome according to morphological and functional groups was derived from the process used by certified Soil Food Web (SFW) laboratories and taught to the participants by the french expert Dustin.
Discussion panel about Women’s safety in the workplace
In support of the 16 days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence, the Women’s Economic and Social Empowerment Program in Egypt organized a panel discussion on “Women’s safety in the workplace”, The gender equity case for private sector companies. EBDA took part in that discussion in order to know more about this and transparently know how the association’s workplace is supporting this. The Panelists were representatives from the Government of Egypt, USAID as well as legal, gender, and private sector engagement experts; discussing policies and mechanisms which protect women in the workplace and facilitate their access to the labor market, emphasizing the significance of community mobilization and men’s engagement in achieving gender equality, and highlighting incentives for the private sector to adopt gender measures.
BioTex project kick-off
EBDA (Demeter Egypt) participated in the relevant kick-off workshop of BioTex Egypt at Sekem Farm with participants from the Organic Egypt project, Knowledge hub project, UNIDO and from the bbw (the fund of the project). The project objective of BioTex is to contribute to the economic, social and environmental development of the textile sector in Egypt. The discussion included many different aspects regarding all the participant’s perspectives and experience in this sector. Eventually, Justus Harm the EBDA (Demeter Egypt) Director and Naglaa Ahmed were presenting how the association and Economy of Love can contribute to the objective of the project.
