2025 Award "Best Practice in Citizen Participation"

The project is called “Women Carers: Hearts that Care” and is made up of women carers. The main activity consists of creating meeting spaces where these women can make products from recycled fabrics or textile scraps, which they then sell either to the community in general or to various institutions. It consists of a process through which discarded textile waste and scraps of fabric are collected, classified and transformed into a new product that can be marketed, such as handbags, bags, toiletry bags, placemats, among others. The acquisition and development of different emotional, intellectual and financial resources is also promoted in this space.

Three stages can be defined: Process of collecting and classifying textile waste; production and making of the products; sale and socialization of the products. Regarding the latter, the products are sold at the stands and fairs that take place in Despeñaderos, and sales will also be promoted through social networks and at the workshop, where the products will be on display.

The idea is to coordinate a comprehensive approach whose main focus is on women who care for people with disabilities and who are also single parents with weakened or non-existent primary and secondary networks. That is why the aim is to achieve a balance between caring for others in the traditional way and at the same time developing individually to become part of the modern world through personal growth. The aim is to support these women, to create a space where they can meet others in similar situations, develop their potential and their ability to find resources that enable self-management and simultaneously build support and containment networks among peers. This is accompanied by textile recycling practices, to later make products and market them.

In this way, our commitment to textile circularity has a significant impact on the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. Our work directly promotes environmental protection, while driving economic growth and strengthening social commitment in the textile sector. It also promotes gender equality and empowers women by paying attention to the needs of this disadvantaged community.

https://despenaderos.gob.ar/ (External link)

Video (External link)