Afghanistan Women Council

Relief Activities
AWC has provided 500 women with relief aid in the winter during the current year and supported many more on a monthly basis. AWC has completed a relief project for 50 families providing them with the necessary materials for shelter, food, and safe water.

Development Activities
AWC has completed drinking water projects with the people’s support to provide 25 families with clean drinking water (a deep well with a hand pump), in the Ben e Hisar area about 10 km. from Kabul to the south and in the Deh Afghanan area in Kabul, Istalif, about 5 km. to the north of Kabul and the Shkeen village of Birmal District, Paktika Province.

Women Support Program

AWC has four offices in Kabul, a main office in Qala e Fatullah, where 100 women are gaining a basic education, psychosocial support and counseling, environment protection, women’s leadership, skill and trade training, and are benefiting from the Micro-Finance program. After accomplishment of their course, AWC will provide these women with a loan to run their own businesses in their selected trades. 150 children of the mothers in the program are gaining an education and receiving biscuits, milk and food.

AWC is currently supporting 800 women. 100 women are learning knitting, tailoring, Mohra Dozi, sewing, soap making, poultry farming and honey bee keeping.

250 women are learning skills such as sweet and pickle making in the old city area "Shoor Bazar" and 250 are learning kitchen gardening in the Bene Hesar areas. About 300 women received loans and are running their own businesses and supporting their families from the income of their businesses. This number will go up to 1000 women by the end of this year.

Afghan Women Weekly/Cultural Activities

The first monthly 8 page newspaper in two languages (Dari and Pushtu) was established in 1994 and is ongoing. This newspaper mainly reflects AWC activities in various fields such as human rights abuses, women’s rights issues, the plight of Afghan refugees in camps, and displacement. This newspaper also publishes ideas, suggestions of women, features national personalities and intellectuals on the current Afghanistan situation, and rehabilitation issues. The newspaper has been widely distributed in rural and urban communities, Afghan Schools, as well as the diplomatic missions in Islamabad, United Nations, NGOs, donors, and Afghan communities in Pakistan and in schools, NGOs, diplomatic missions, and Government offices in Afghanistan.

AWC has established an office for its weekly publication. The Minister of Culture visited AWC’s Library. The Cultural Affairs office is in Qala e Fatullah, Kabul. AWC was running the only women monthly to reflect women’s issues in the fundamental Islamic environment in Peshawar, Pakistan since 1986. The main objectives of the monthly were:
To inform Afghan women of the human rights abuses taking place.
To raise awareness of the plight of women and children in the refugee camps.
To protect and support women’s rights and prestige in the community.
To persuade, encourage and mobilize Afghan women in bringing peace and stability in the country.
To make women aware of their responsibilities towards the miserable condition of Afghanistan.
To try to unite Afghan women and defend their rights.
AWC ran the monthly from its own sources without support of any donors since its establishment. When AWC moved most of its activities to Afghanistan, the Afghan women monthly activities also had to move to Kabul and began its publication in Kabul for two months. After two months, due to the need for it, it was decided by the board of trustees and the working committee of AWC to publish the AWC monthly of Zan e Afghan on a weekly basis. The founder and chairperson of AWC opened an office in Kabul for AWC’s cultural activities and began seminars, workshops and meetings with writers, politicians, scholars, professors and other intellectuals to discuss the country’s present situation. AWC sought to reflect their ideas, suggestions and recommendations for the rapid, visible rehabilitation of Afghanistan.

Skills training in AWC’s Shoor Bazar Office

AWC has opened an office in Shoor Bazar where 250 widows and the most vulnerable women are provided with a basic education, psychosocial support, counseling and skills training in sweet and pickle making which is a marketable product in the area. These women will be provided with loans after they complete the course. They will run their own businesses to support their families.

Skills Training in AWC’s Ben e Hesar Office

AWC has an office in the Bene Hesar area of about 10 Km out of Kabul. This office gives training in kitchen gardening and flower growing to 250 widows and the most vulnerable women in the area. They also provide basic education, environmental protection, psychosocial support, and counseling. 300 women have received loans after completion of their Micro-Finance and trade course. Women who received loans are running their own businesses and supporting their families. This number will go up to 1000 women by the end of the year.by the end of the year. Widows and the most vulnerable women are targeted beneficiaries of the program. The MF program is ongoing in three areas of Kabul; Ben e Hesar, Deh Afghanan and Qal e Musa. These 300 women whom trained in various skills are now running their own businesses and supporting their families. They will receive a second and third loan which will be more then the first one. According to the women, their economic needs have been fulfilled to some extent and will be fully achieved when they receive the second and third loans.