Number of Afghan women entrepreneurs up by 66 percent

KABUL (Pajhwok): The number of businesswomen has increased by 66 percent compared to their number in the previous year in Afghanistan, with 2,000 women having business licenses and 120,000 others running small businesses.

Ministry of Commerce and Industry spokesman Akhundzada Abdul Salam Jawad told Pajhwok that the number of new female investors increased by 66 percent in 1401 solar year compared to 1400.

He said 385 women had been issued licenses for business companies in 1400 and their number surged to 641 in 1401.

He said now the Afghanistan Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry had 560 members and around 8,000 women were practically doing various businesses in the entire country.

These women are mostly associated with handicrafts, agriculture, health, food and mining sectors.

Jawad believed women could play key role in strengthening economy and their investments could increase the level of food security of families and alleviate poverty in the country.

Fariba Noori, acting head of the Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s board of directors, said many women who lost jobs after the regime change had switched to businesses.

She put the number of women investors at around 2,000 and said 120,000 women who lacked official licenses ran small businesses.

Out of the 2,000 women, 1,100 have established large businesses and have obtained licenses from the ministries of trade, industry and economy and the remaining 900 have obtained work permits from the municipality.

These women were active in the sectors of agriculture, health, industry, handicrafts, food, mines and education and their investments touched two to three million dollars.

Without giving details, Noori said due to women’s investments and businesses, many other women as well as men were on job.

She said men were hired as drivers and guards, the jobs women could not do themselves.

Noori said every factory had employed people based on their investment and production and there were factories hiring up 300 people like wool processing, dry fruits processing, carpet weaving and some other factories, but there were factories where only up to ten women worked.

However, Fariba said the 66 percent increase in the number of businesswomen did not mean they all ran large businesses.

“Maybe 10 percent of these women have big factories and businesses, but the rest have small businesses and they just earn bread for their families.”

About the market of goods produced by women in Afghanistan, she said fortunately Afghanistan was a consuming country and everything produced domestically was consumed in the country.

She said the Women’s Chamber of Commerce had centers in five zones, Nangarhar, Herat, Balkh, Kandahar and Kabul, and had offices in the rest of the provinces.

After the political change, the Women’s Chamber of Commerce offices remained closed for six months.

“After the regime change, we all were concerned, but we were assured that the Islamic Emirate has no problem with us and we have no problem with the emirate.”

She said after the political change, some members of the board of directors went abroad, but when the chamber was reopened, they elected Salma Yusufzai as president of the chamber.

She called on the Islamic Emirate to provide more facilities to businesswomen in obtaining licenses, give them relief in taxes and announce incentives to encourage them to do investment.

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