WAW’s efforts in Afghanistan are directed by board member Fahima Vorgetts through our Afghan Women’s Fund. Fahima travels to Afghanistan several times per year to bring donated money, clothing, and equipment such as sewing machines, computers, and microscopes, which she distributes primarily to nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) that are dedicated to alleviating the suffering of women and empowering them to live independent lives. These are organizations with a proven record of success.
In Afghanistan WAW primarily supports the projects of two NGOs, Humanitarian Organization for Orphans and Widows of Afghanistan (HOOWA), cofounded in 2001 by Fahima, and Humanitarian Assistance for Widows and Children of Afghanistan (HAWCA), founded and directed by Orzala Ashraf.
HOOWA currently runs four literacy classes and assists at five others that were started by a local woman with no official support in Khair Khana, a district north of Kabul. There are generally 20-25 adult women in each class although one includes teenage girls whose families keep them from public schools because the schools are far from their villages or because they are coed. In addition, HOOWA runs two carpet
weaving and two tailoring classes in Guzargah and hopes to start individual poultry farms for widows in June. HOOWA will purchase the peeps, supervise the construction of coops, supply food and vaccines for 6 months, and train widows in marketing techniques. It costs about $600 to start each farm. HOOWA is currently looking for a location with electricity to start training classes in computer literacy (Fahima has already brought the computers to Afghanistan.), and when resources permit, HOOWA plans to start training in beekeeping, another income resource for women. All HOOWA’s training classes have a literacy component.
There are well over 1 million destitute widows in Afghanistan. They are now the sole support of their fatherless children and/or grandchildren, whose parents were killed by the Mujahideen or by the Taliban. Most widows are illiterate, have never earned money, and have no income-producing skills.
HAWCA runs about two hundred literacy/vocational training classes in refugee camps in Peshawar and Afghanistan, including about eight centers in Kabul. While HAWCA receives most of its funding from organizations in Spain and Italy, Fahima has close ties to this remarkable NGO and helps whenever she has the resources. On her last trip to Afghanistan in March, 2003, she distributed cooking oil to students in HAWCA’s literacy class. In addition, WAW helps support the Arbab Road School in the Peshawar refugee camp, which Fahima provided the funds to start almost two years ago and which HAWCA runs on money Fahima donates from sales of her carpets and other sources. This school takes care of orphans and destitute children.
While these are WAW’s main projects, when Fahima is in Afghanistan, she also donates money on an ad hoc basis to women’s projects that are in dire straights and can hugely profit from immediate assistance. For example, on her last trip she purchased a stove, 18 sewing machines, and fabric for a RAWA-operated tailoring class and donated school supplies to various literacy classrooms. In addition, she purchased vines for 100 women-headed families in a village whose income-producing vineyards had been torched by the Taliban.
These projects are the first and essential step toward empowering women in Afghanistan to emerge from a servile state of total dependency, to lead productive, self-sufficient lives, to participate in the reconstruction of their country, and eventually to make their voices heard in the debates over how equal rights for women and women’s human rights will figure in the political and judicial future of Afghanistan.
If you wish to add your support to these projects, please make your check out to Women for Afghan Women and specify Afghan Women’s Fund on the memo line. 100% of this money will go to Afghanistan.
Click here to see Fahima Vorgett's report regarding the donations she delivered on her recent trip to Afghanistan.
