It is 10 o'clock in the morning on this Saturday, May 24th. The young people of the "Badael" Association for Childhood and Youth are busy preparing their equipment. It is the "D-Day" set to carry out a major tree planting and cleaning operation in the neighbourhoods located near the Laâyayda Youth Centre. On the menu, there is also an awareness-raising action for children on the importance of preserving the environment. After gathering more than 50 participants, the young people divided into two groups. The first went around 11 a.m. to the Laâyayda Youth Centre. Objective: clean the surroundings of this structure and give it a new face. The young people first devoted themselves to painting the pavements and collecting rubbish, before tackling the planting of trees within the Youth Centre and in the neighbouring neighbourhoods. "We wanted through this action to make young people aware of the importance of preserving the environment and to demonstrate to them, by involving them in the collection of waste and the sweeping of streets, that keeping the premises in good condition is not as difficult as they might imagine. We have all developed this idea that the maintenance of the environment is the exclusive responsibility of the local authority. Yet this action is everyone's business," underlines Anas Touima, a member of the association.

Indeed, with very few means, this association has managed to mobilise many inhabitants of the neighbourhood, but also members of the urban commune of Salé, a major actor in this initiative which, let us underline, has largely received the appreciation of the riverside population. "I am very happy to see that my neighbourhood can show a face other than the one I usually see. Now, I realise that it is more pleasant to live in a clean neighbourhood," says, with a broad smile, Ahmed, a young local resident who participated in the activity. According to Anas Touima, the young people showed an unprecedented willingness to join this movement, hence the need to launch similar initiatives more frequently. "I estimate through this experience and the previous ones that what young people lack is nothing other than guidance, and this is the role that local associations must precisely fulfil. These organisations must indeed encourage young people to become serious and committed actors in the protection of the environment. But associations do not always play their role well," explains this associative actor. It should be noted that this Day was also reserved for the organisation of other activities for the children of the same neighbourhood that the second group of the association chose to host. Thus, more than 100 children were able to take part during the same morning in an activity organised by the same NGO, in partnership with the Laayayda Youth Centre. This consisted of the screening of a documentary film on the importance of protecting the environment, as well as a round table hosted by young associative actors in the presence of the director of the Youth Centre, during which a strong participation of children's parents was recorded.

Business card: Created in 2013 by a handful of ambitious young people aspiring to change, the "Badael" Association sets itself the objective of supervising the young people and children of the city of Salé through the organisation of various events, notably the organisation of animation days in hospitals, as well as the holding of round tables, cultural meetings, and awareness days. Today, the Association has taken up residence at the Laâyayda Youth Centre. It is there that it now organises numerous activities for children, in parallel with the other missions it has assigned itself.