P01
Permaculture
Growing resilient ecosystems through food, water, energy and biodiversity.
Assalam Community Foundation, Kizimkazi, Zanzibar
Growing PeaceThrough Living Wisdom
A Living PEACE Village in Zanzibar where traditional knowledge becomes regenerative living, community resilience and practical inspiration for the future.
01 / A living culture
Enter Zanzibar through the voices, music and shared rhythms that carry its living heritage.
Sound on
02 / Why We Exist
Local wisdom.
Global solutions.
Kizimkazi, Zanzibar
Across the world, communities are searching for solutions to climate change, social fragmentation and unsustainable development.
Yet many of the answers already exist—embedded in traditional ways of building, growing food, educating children and living together.
Born in the 1,000-year-old fishing village of Kizimkazi, Zanzibar, and inspired by one of the world's oldest living coastal civilizations, Assalam brings together traditional wisdom, regenerative living, education and community leadership to develop practical solutions for a changing world.
We believe every community already holds the wisdom it needs.
Our mission is to help rediscover it, strengthen it and share it with the world.
The shift
From Isolated Projects to Regenerative Communities
These challenges are deeply interconnected—and isolated projects cannot solve interconnected problems.
One living system
We call this model a PEACE Village.
A PEACE Village is not an eco-village, a school or a tourism project. It is a community where regeneration is designed into everyday life—where children learn by growing food, women build local enterprises, cultural heritage creates livelihoods, tourism strengthens local ownership, and healthy ecosystems support resilient communities.
We believe the future of development will not be measured by the number of projects delivered, but by the number of communities that become capable of shaping their own future.
Our mission is to help communities design those futures.
See the PEACE Framework03 / The PEACE Framework
The world often looks to the future for solutions. We look to our roots.
Along the Swahili Coast, generations developed ways of living that strengthened communities, worked with nature, celebrated beauty and created shared prosperity.
At Assalam, we have distilled these enduring values into the PEACE Framework.
Rather than inventing a new model, PEACE reinterprets living traditions for the challenges of the 21st century. While rooted in Zanzibar, it is designed to help every community rediscover and strengthen its own cultural and ecological wisdom.
E02
Education
Learning by doing, sharing and living together.
A03
Art
Architecture, craftsmanship, music, storytelling and the art of everyday life.
C04
Community
Ubuntu, belonging, participation and local leadership.
E05
Empowerment
Women, enterprise, dignity and sustainable livelihoods.
Swipe to explore all five pillars
04 / Living PEACE Village
A place where ideas become reality.
Architecture, ecology, learning, heritage and livelihoods work together here as one connected PEACE system.
01Built environment
Earth House
02Built environment
Makuti Architecture
03Built environment
Renewable Energy
04Living systems
Rainwater Harvesting
05Living systems
Food Forest
06Living systems
School Gardens
07Knowledge and heritage
Mobile Library
08Knowledge and heritage
Spice Route Museum
09Knowledge and heritage
Sawa Ensemble
10Community and opportunity
Journey Theatre / Maulid ya Homu
11Community and opportunity
Amphitheatre
12Community and opportunity
Women's Workshop
Each experience opens a detailed page and shows how it contributes to the wider PEACE framework.
Explore the Village05 · Impact
Stronger communities. Healthier ecosystems. Knowledge carried forward.
We measure success not only in numbers, but in stronger communities, healthier ecosystems and knowledge passed to the next generation. Each figure below keeps its original scope and reporting period.
01
Lives and beneficiaries reached
Organization-reported aggregate · 2017-2025
1,202,000
02
Trees planted
Across Assalam's work · through June 2026
10,000+
03
Participants in travelling learning
Mobile Library and Cultural Workshops · through June 2026
15,000+
04
Women graduated
Empowerment milestones · through June 2026
200+
05
Iftar meals served
Ramadan community programme · 2026
22,098
06
Acres in the Living PEACE Village
Foundation-provided site figure
24
06 · Stories
1,202,000
lives.
1,202,000 stories.
Scale matters. So does the dignity, voice and lived experience of every person within it. Human stories keep the impact personal.
Explore Human StoriesSource: Assalam Community Foundation Data Driven Report 2017-2025. The aggregate may include different definitions of reach and participation; stories are published only with editorial and safeguarding review.
Choose your journey
Real voices. Living knowledge. Many ways in.
Watch a curated selection from the official Assalam Community Foundation channel. Each path keeps three films; swipe, scroll or use the arrow controls to explore.
Visit the YouTube channel01
Who We Are
Stories of Assalam, Zanzibar heritage and travelling with purpose.
02
Explore our village
Eco Village
An introduction to Assalam through its campus, community and eco-village.
03
Regenerative Living
Food
Permaculture practice, resilient food systems and land restoration.
04
Women
Empowerment
Women’s journeys, enterprise and economic agency.
05
Education
School life, learning journeys and education beyond the classroom.
06
Swahili Heritage
Living traditions, music and Zanzibar’s cultural memory.
07
Community
First-person stories that connect community impact to individual lives.
07 / Learning
Learn by Living
We believe the most meaningful learning happens through shared experience.
Choose a pathway to message our learning team on WhatsApp.
More information
Not sure which learning pathway fits?
For current details, availability or help choosing a pathway, message the Assalam learning team directly on WhatsApp.
WhatsApp +255 776 143 28408 / Network
One village today.
Many tomorrow.
A network rooted in place and open to communities adapting the PEACE approach through their own culture, ecology and knowledge.
Explore Build YoursAssalam in the world
Knowledge moves through relationships.
Living village
Kizimkazi, Zanzibar
Cultural connection
Istanbul Swahili Culture Centre
+
Your community, shaped by its own place
Network · Partners
Change grows through collaboration.
Our work is strengthened by local and global organizations that share a commitment to resilient communities and regenerative futures.
09 / Build Yours
Build Your Living PEACE Village
We don't want to build villages around the world. We want to help communities build their own.