From December 7 to 20, 2025, Héloïse Ruban, Microprojects Officer at La Guilde, and Dario Gleitz, Country Coordination Assistant at La Guilde in Senegal, carried out a field mission in several regions of Senegal as part of’a system dedicated to youth and social and professional integration.
A program specifically designed for youth and social and professional integration in Senegal
In 2023, supported by the French Development Agency and the French Foundatione, The Guild has launched a call for projects focusing on youth, social and professional integration. On this occasion, Seven projects were funded. throughout Senegal, enabling young people to receive vocational training in Nubian vault construction and in-demand trades, to attend art school, or to develop an agroecological garden.
Some background information
In 2023, Senegal had over 18 million inhabitants, half of whom were under 19 years old, according to the latest general census. This reality represents considerable potential for the country's development, but also poses major challenges in terms of social and professional integration.
First of all, Access to training remains unequal, both from a territorial and financial perspective. While the vocational training offer has become structured at the national level, it remains largely concentrated in major urban centers, particularly in Dakar where approximately 60% vocational training establishments are located, leaving many young people from other regions, especially rural or isolated areas, with limited prospects. Registration costs particularly in Vocational Training Centres (CPF) also constitute a significant obstacle for the most vulnerable groups.A significant proportion of young people are thus closed off from many opportunities, particularly professional ones, due to a lack of resources to access training.
In several territories, young people have to deal with a lack of suitable infrastructure, support mechanisms and local economic opportunities. In the cultural sector, training and professional development opportunities are scarce outside the capital. The city of Tambacounda, a cultural hub of Senegal, in particular, lacks such services, especially spaces dedicated to exchanges between young artists. In agriculture, a sector central to rural areas, constraints related to equipment, irrigation, land ownership, and marketing hinder the recognition of young people's work and limit the sustainability of agricultural activities.
In this context, social and professional integration cannot be conceived solely from the perspective of access to formal employment. It presupposes long-term support, skills development adapted to local realities, and the creation of economic opportunities rooted in the territories. It is at the intersection of these issues that the initiatives encountered during the mission carried out in December are situated, seeking to make young people true actors in the development of their community.
A mission at the heart of local realities
From Cap Skirring to Kédougou, via Tambacounda and Vélingara, this mission was an opportunity to...to meet the teams of several supported micro-projects, their partners and the beneficiaries of these projects.
The objective of this mission was to to understand how the supported projects contribute concretely to the social and professional integration of young people, beyond the numerical indicators, by observing the human, community and territorial dynamics at work.
Training for in-demand professions in Boucotte
The first step in this mission: the project of the’Nio Far association in Boucotte, near Cap Skirring in Casamance.
The Nio Far association proposed Between 2023 and 2025, seven training programs will be offered to young people in the region, which is heavily affected by school dropout rates, high unemployment, particularly among young people, and a vocational training offer poorly adapted to the realities of the area.. Various professions and themes were addressed: telephone repairers, landscape worker, screen printing operator, building painter, entrepreneurship and leadership, solar energy technician or even professionalizing one's activity through digital technology.
82 young people participated in these training courses, enabling them to then For some, it's about finding a job directly; for others, it's about opening up previously unavailable professional opportunities., such as an internship or resuming more advanced studies.
Thérèse, trained in entrepreneurship and leadership: "The fewer of us there are, the more we understand.".
Most of the training sessions were held in small groups with about ten young people present, allowing them to have technical and practical training adapted to each individual, as well as support during the training and for several months afterwards by the association's coordinators.
Biram, a building painting instructor: "I'm proud of the young people I've trained here. [...] To satisfy customers, you have to know how to talk to customers, make quotes, work properly, and the young people understood that very quickly.".
For more than twenty-five years, Biram, a house painter in Casamance, expressed the desire to train Casamance youth in order to pass on his knowledge in turn; this has now been achieved thanks to this project.
Awa herself became an entrepreneurship trainer for a Senegalese association, in order to share her knowledge with other young people wanting to start their own businesses. Her goal is to "give back to the community".
The Nio Far association is also very committed to environmental preservation and, in this context, has launched a plastic processing unit, run by five women, in Cap Skirring. to recycle the plastic collected in the area in order to reuse it.
An art school as a space for creation and exchange among young people
Second stage of this mission across Senegal: Tambacounda, and the Free label association.
The "Tamba School of Art" space«, proposed by the’Senegalese association Free label, East dedicated to young artists (or not yet) who wish to flourish through the practice of visual and sound art. Thanks to free artistic training, premises available daily for young people with equipment provided such as a sound studio, drawing and painting materials, cameras and videos, this school offers a meeting space for young people allowing them to improve their techniques, go further in their creativity, have a space of confidence and reference points, but also to meet with professionals in the sector.
Mame Diarra, high school student and singer:
«"It will help [people] to develop their skills, whether in music or drawing […] to meet different people [to] exchange our inspirations."»
Evenings, concerts, national and international residencies are also organised within the art school for to offer young people in Tambacounda an opening to the world, and to represent Tambacounda throughout the world.
December 3, 2026 will also be open Griot.te.s Museum This museum is intended to host temporary and permanent exhibitions of artistic productions by griots and griottes. The objective is to to highlight this culture based on oral tradition, which is deeply rooted in Senegal in particular. Adjacent to the art school, this part of the building is still under construction but promises to offer a beautiful space for showcasing national and international artists, as well as young artists such as those who attend the art school.
Abou, co-director of the Tamba School of Art, reflects on the projects they have been working on since 2021 with Free Label: «I am satisfied; we have everything we dreamed of for years, which is now coming to fruition. The things that will enter the museum… We are going to help the young artists of Tamba.»
Salif "Lying Truth", a student, cartoonist and slam poet, dreams big and testifies: "Free label [...] is a family, they are people who give everything without expecting anything in return. I want to work with them, travel with them, and do more research and acquire more knowledge."«
During the visit to this project, a video was made to present this project, this association and their impact on the young generation of Senegalese.
Community gardens offered to young people from different regions
The projects visited afterwards have one thing in common: vegetable production is at the heart of the activities carried out.
The third stage of this mission, the association Mouvement de la Jeunesse Vélingaroise en France (MJVF) in partnership with the Association Union des Acteurs pour le Développement du Département de Vélingara (UADDV) have developed a Agricultural Economic Zone for Women of Medina Dinguiraye, about ten kilometers from Vélingara.
Thanks to 3 hectares of land, a market gardening production was launched by 140 women under 35 years old in order to offer local fruit and vegetable production to the population.
The majority of locally consumed produce comes from northern Senegal, where it is intensively grown, before being transported for several days and then sold in Vélingara to women in the area who then resell the produce from roadside stalls. Despite the availability of land in Medina Dinguiraye, very few women and men cultivate their own produce. The ZEAF project was established to address this shortage.
Training sessions were conducted on the premises of the village's primary school, led by an agricultural technician, for women., to best support them in launching their business. Facilities have also been installed to enable this production, including a solar-powered pumping system with a water tower. Other types of production, such as fish farming and livestock breeding, are also planned for the coming years.
Following a day off visiting the Dindefelo waterfall near Kédougou, a majestic spectacle of nature within a community reserve, the fourth stage of the "Social and professional integration in Senegal" mission took place in Noubou, in a small village between Kédougou and Salémata, less than 5km from the border with Guinea.
L'’Association of Young People from Salémata in Kédougou (AJRSK) has put in place a community garden for the village youth, with a a vegetable garden area and another fruit orchard. Thanks to the strong motivation of young people to become self-reliant through this garden, as well as the mobilization of international partners such as the AGIRabcd association, the AJRSK association offers a agro-ecological school for 35 young people from the commune of Noubou, including training in market gardening techniques, the construction of a borehole with a solar pump, retention basins and a water tower, as well as the establishment of local vegetable and fruit crops, a compost and a live melliferous hedge.
Labo Diallo, president of the AJRSK association: «Before the training, people didn’t know how to grow vegetables. Before, we put everything in the same plant, and now, we plant tomatoes separately, okra separately, onions separately…»
Finally, to conclude this mission, a visit to the project led by the’Association for International and National Exchanges (AEIN) in partnership with the’Association of Mothers of Students of Gourel Diadié (AME) near Tambacounda, was carried out. This project was funded as part of the Autumn 2022 call for projects, within the framework of the multi-thematic and multi-country program led by La Guilde.
A vegetable garden using organic farming methods has thus been put in place by 45 women members of the mothers' association in order to improve family income.
The women involved in the project express a strong attachment to the garden, perceived as a collective space for production and solidarity.
Seynabou, President of AME, emphasizes the desire to maintain the project despite some difficulties, and underlines the importance of the garden for the food security of families, especially students who go to school, and for the economic empowerment of women.
In Boucotte, Tambacounda, Vélingara and Noubou, the projects are based on solid human ecosystems, where trust and collaboration between project leaders and beneficiaries are at the heart of the activities.
This mission provided a better understanding of the realities faced by young people in different regions of Senegal, and also highlighted the commitment of French and Senegalese associations to addressing the needs identified in these areas. Whether through vocational training, artistic creation, or agricultural projects, these micro-projects demonstrate how social and professional integration can take diverse and locally rooted forms.
The lessons learned from these visits will contribute to the capitalisation work carried out by La Guilde in order to continue to support initiatives that offer opportunities for young people.
To learn more
Regarding the projects:
- Presentation of the Nio Far association project
- Presentation of the Free Label association's project
- Presentation of the project of the Vélingar Youth Movement association in France
- Presentation of the project of the Association of Young People from Salémata in Kédougou
- Presentation of the Association for International and National Exchanges project
Regarding other projects from the "Youth, social and professional integration in Senegal" call for projects conducted in 2023:
- Presentation of the project of the Apiculture Flore Développement (Apiflordev) association : project to promote and implement beekeeping in the Saloum delta
- Presentation of the project of the Association for the Sociocultural Development of Agnam Lidoubé (ADSCAL) : youth training project building ecological housing using Nubian vault techniques, near Matam
A look back at the 2023 call for projects on "Youth, social and professional integration" in Senegal: