About A.P.E

APE “Association for the Protection of the Environment” is a non-government organization. Established in 1984 to improve the lives of garbage collectors also known as ´Zabaleen, in the "Garbage City" located at the foot of the Mokattam Mountain in Cairo.

The Association’s goals are both to improve living standards within Zabbaleen communities and to protect the environment through creation of a better understanding of the dynamics of household garbage collection in urban areas, and promotion of waste reduction, reuse and recycling initiatives.

APE and EDUCATION

The APE projects target drop out girls and mothers  who had had to go out on the garbage route as children and were deprived of the chance to go to school. These women were recruited into what APE calls the 'learning and earning' school - a project-based learning  model that incorporates all the elements of school learning but in a recycling project revolving around the transformation of recyclable materials into marketable products.  The project incorporates literacy, business skills, computer skills in addition to  personal and environmental hygiene and empowerment to deal with culture-specific matters such as female circumcision, early marriage, and others.

One of the APE initiatives has been the construction of a center for workshops producing patchwork and recycled paper products. Starting by collecting rags from the textile mills and factories, the center today teaches young women how to sort, design, cut, sew,  weave, iron and recycle these fabrics into patchwork quilts, bedspreads, rugs, bags and other marketable items.

APE and other services

In addition to the educational services that APE provides they also currently provide a small healthcare facility and a daycare facility for young children and primary school classes to young children of the community. They are also open to school trips, where they educate children about waste and the importance of recycling to raise the awareness of the upcoming generations.