RAF builds traditional village in Tunisia

By Sanaullah Ataullah 
DOHA: Sheikh Thani Bin Abdullah Foundation for Humanitarian Services (RAF) has built a traditional village at a cost of QR4.6m in Tauzar Governorate of Tunisia to preserve ancestors’ professions and provide jobs to artisans.

The village developed over an area of 4,300sqm houses 20 workshops with 200 artisans and a hall to showcase their products for sale. The workshops deal with making items from palm tree wood and leafs, designs on wall, hand-stitching, traditional stitching of dresses, blacksmith tools, and earthenware among other handicrafts.
“The new facility, a generous gesture of RAF, has 350,000 handicrafts of 90 types,” said Asma Al Madhuyb, Director-General, Tunisian National Diwan for Traditional Industries. 
“The village will help provide jobs to 5,000 artisans annually. It will also help revive traditional industries as Tunisian heritage is very special. Tunisian artisans rely on natural materials like palm trees for handicrafts,” said Al Madhuyb.
The village was named ‘Qastilia’ after the name of Tauzar in the first Islamic era as it is a miniature of Biledulgerid in buildings and other components. Biledulgerid (the country of dates) was formerly a country in Northern Africa, south of Mount Atlas, bounded on the north by Tunis on the west by Algiers and the Sahara on the east by Tripoli, supposed to be about 180 square  miles. 
The village was inaugurated in a ceremony attended by Qatari Ambassador to Tunisia Abdullah bin Nassir Al Humaidi, a RAF delegation led by Mohammad Salah Ibrahim and Tauzar Governor Lutfi Sasi.The Peninsula