Circular Economy & Waste-to-Value

Waste is a resource in the wrong place. This programme area turns material that would otherwise be burned, dumped or left in coastal waters into income, jobs and cleaner communities.

What this covers

Community-scale plastic recycling projects, now running in Sierra Leone with country-specific tracks under development for Zimbabwe and The Gambia, turn plastic waste into a circular social enterprise.

A community biogas and waste-to-energy pilot converts organic waste into usable energy. A pottery enterprise hub gives makers firing access and entrepreneurship training around ClayWorks production. A mycelium innovation pilot, MycoLoop, explores mushroom-based packaging and building materials, with a potential livelihood strand around mushroom cultivation. A septic and solid-waste project, built around community ownership, addresses waste and public health together on the coast.

How we work

Each project pairs a local implementing partner, who runs the operation and hires locally, with donor coordination, monitoring and learning support from Ayara’s side. That keeps projects grounded in what a community can actually run and maintain, while still meeting the documentation funders expect.