U.S. Commitment to Afghan Women: The U.S.-Afghan Women’s Council

June 2004: The Council’s fifth meeting was held in Washington, DC in the Treaty Room of the White House on June 15, 2004. Members and invited Afghan and American special guests discussed several key issues, including the Afghan national elections, health care, and jobs. President Bush, President Karzai, Secretary Powell, National Security Advisor Rice, and Secretary of Health and Human Services Thompson met with the group. First Lady Laura Bush honored the Council with a lunch. More than 20 Afghan women attended the meeting and the lunch, including four Afghan Fulbright scholars (a U.S. Department of State educational exchange program), four Afghan women judges on a USAWC training project, and 12 U.S. Department of Agriculture Cochran Fellows in the U.S.  for a U.S. Department of Agriculture program for job training in agribusiness.

February 2004: The fourth meeting of the Council was held in Kabul, February 24-26, 2004. Discussions focused on education, specifically the Teacher Training Institute and Afghan Literacy initiative; microfinance; the new constitution; and the upcoming elections in 2004. The delegation visited a women’s center and met with project managers of programs supported by the U.S. Government and by the U.S.-Afghan Women’s Council.

July 2003: The Council’s third meeting, in Washington, D.C., July 15-16, 2003, focused on the educational needs of women and girls, job skills training, business development, and the upcoming elections. The delegation met with First Lady Laura Bush and National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice at the White House. Secretary Powell hosted a luncheon in their honor.

January 2003: At the Council’s second meeting in Kabul, the U.S. announced that it would provide $2.5 million for women’s resource centers in 14 of Afghanistan’s provinces. The Council also committed $1 million in education and exchange programs for the centers. Programs at these centers focus on basic education literacy, microfinance and small business opportunities, human rights education, and the development and management of non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

Inaugural Meeting: The inaugural meeting took place in Washington, D.C. in April 2002. In response to a request from the Afghan side, the Council later announced its first initiative would bring Afghan women who work in government ministries to the United States for an educational exchange program. The program focused on computer training, leadership, and management training, and other skills vital to their positions.

Accomplishments

Political Participation
Women’s Resource Center: USAID, along with a $60,000-donation from the women executives of AOL/Time Warner, is building 17 Women’s Resource Centers in Afghanistan. Two centers opened in June, 2004 (Nangarhar and Takhar). An additional 1 to 2 centers will open in late 2004/early 2005 and plans are underway for eight additional sites.

Afghan Women Leaders Connect ($10,000): Intended contribution will support a conference hosted by the Women and Children Legal Research Foundation focusing on legal rights. This is in addition to the February announcement of $10,000 that AWLC provided to the International Association of Women Judges and the $75,000 grant by the State Department’s International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Bureau, which is providing training in civil and family law for four Afghan women judges.

Digital Video Conference: The Council has used digital videoconference (DVC) technology to connect Kabul; Washington, DC; and New York, setting up links for discussions and mentoring sessions between women in these cities. The most recent DVC, in November 2003, focused on women’s political participation in Afghanistan’s draft constitution and the upcoming Afghan elections in 2004. The previous DVC, in April 2003, focused on the topic of women and business.

Economic Opportunities
Community Banks: The Council views microcredit as an important means of helping women gain self-sufficiency through starting their own businesses. Through an original $10,000 donation to the Council from Daimler-Chrysler, the Foundation for International Community Assistance (FINCA), a leading NGO in microfinance, will help start two village banks in Herat. Daimler-Chrysler contributed an additional $25,000 in February 2004 to construct another 5 community banks to support microfinance loans for women in Heart province. FINCA expects to assist more than 30,000 clients in Afghanistan over the next 5 years.

USAID Microenterprise Initiative ($5 million): American and Afghan businesswomen will partner in a project focused on Afghan handicrafts and production methods to assist them in designing and manufacturing products in Afghanistan that can be subsequently sold in the U.S.

U.S. Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs/USAWC Department of State Grants ($750,000): Five grants were awarded to organizations for proposals that include: business and political leadership training (grant to World Learning); entrepreneurship training (grant to Women for Afghan Women); education and literacy training (grants to American Council for International Education and Institute for Training and Development); and women’s leadership training  (grant to University of Delaware).

Thunderbird Graduate School of International Management: Approximately 8-12 businesswomen will participate in advanced entrepreneurship training and serve as mentors/teachers upon their return to Afghanistan. The session is targeted for Winter 2004.

Global Summit of Women ($40,000): Supported by USAID, a delegation of nine Afghan women attended the 2004 Global Summit in Seoul, Korea, in May to discuss trade opportunities and receive entrepreneurship training.

Arzu Carpet Initiative ($530,000): This program provides training and literacy skills to Afghan women in the hand-knotted carpet industry. Connie Duckworth, a USAWC member, provided the seed money to get the project started. Arzu placed its first carpet order on International Women’s Day (March 8, 2004). USAID will provide an additional $100,000 that will go provide more skills training to the women of Afghanistan. The project Arzu (which means "Hope" in Dari) not only creates jobs and a cottage industry, it also re-circulates some of its profits to support microcredit initiatives and additional training for women.

U.S. Department of Agriculture Cochran Fellowships: Twelve women representing 5 provinces were in the United States in Spring 2004 for job training as managers and technicians in agribusiness.

Handcraft Training ($130,000)): The Global Summit of Women (July 2002 in Barcelona, Spain) donated approximately $10,000 for job-skills training for women. Through this program, Shuhada, an NGO, will train women in weaving skills. At the conclusion of the program, the women will receive their own looms to produce textiles for market.

Media
Women Journalists: Under the auspices of USAWC, the U.S. Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) and the News Hour With Jim Lehrer mentored two Afghan women filmmakers in production techniques in 2004. PBS provided modern digital video production and editing equipment for them to use in Afghanistan and training videos for use at AINA, a Kabul-based NGO devoted to media training. With USAWC endorsement, PBS has purchased at a cost of $20,000 per film the North American broadcast rights for two films, "Afghanistan Unveiled," about life under the Taliban, and "Women in Politics" (working title) for airing 2004 and 2005 respectively. These films and several short videos to encourage women to vote were made by the "women’s project" at AINA with Department of State and USAID funding (from Summer 2002- present). The Asia Foundation (TAF) was a partner on the original "Afghanistan Unveiled" project in 2002 and continues to host trainings and screenings of the film (California, Maryland and Sundance Festivals.)

Health
Health Advisory Committee: On July 26, 2004 the Council’s newly formed Health Advisory Committee sponsored a special session to discuss health issues and create public/private partnerships to utilize resources for greater impact and sustainability. Under Secretary Paula Dobriansky hosted the organizing meeting for the committee that Margaret Spellings, Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy, will chair.

Midwife Training: $5-million Rural Education and Community Health Care Initiative (REACH) provides health-related accelerated learning and basic literacy training for women and girls. Training will take place in the Women’s Centers and will target provinces with the highest maternal mortality rates such as Ghazni, Baghlan, and Badakhshan. In April, REACH graduated its first 25 midwives from the program, after they completed an 18-month program in Jalabad. This pilot program is being replicated across Afghanistan. For each new midwife, the U.S. is supporting a lifetime of lives saved.

Afghan Family Health Book: On August 3, 2004, U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Tommy Thompson announced that HHS will distribute the "Afghan Family Health Book" across Afghanistan.  This "talking book" provides useful and practical information about health practices and hygiene, focusing on health promotion and disease prevention.  The books will be distributed via hospitals, clinics, and women's health centers starting in August 2004. The project was developed with Leapfrog Enterprises Inc., a developer, designer, and manufacturer of technology-based educational products.

Education
Fulbright Scholarships: Four Afghan women were awarded Fulbright awards for the academic year 2004-2005 for advanced graduate-level study in the U.S.

Women’s Teacher Training Institute ($4 million): In cooperation with USAID, First Lady Laura Bush announced a USAWC Initiative to establish a Women’s Teacher Training Institute in Kabul in tandem with The Afghan Literacy Initiative, designed to help teach basic literacy to Afghan women in rural areas of Afghanistan. The program will begin in Fall 2004.

Teacher Training: In 2002, the USAWC initiated a teacher-training exchange to bring 30 Afghan women teachers to Nebraska every 6 months for training. In turn, these women will train other teachers in Afghanistan.

Adopt-a-school Program: Church communities in Texas are providing their adopted school with supplies, textbooks, and training.