Sosina Awoke graduated in 2009 in nursing and searched for a job for many years. Later with the help of Addis Ababa City Women and Children Affairs Office she was able to engage in the selling of cosmetics and cloth related business around Arat kilo. She told The Ethiopian Herald that before starting this job she and others have got training regarding the business they are now running.
The office created market linkage for them with Ethio-telecom and Ethiopian Press Agency news paper product like Addis Zemen daily newspaper so that they can make supplementary income, she noted.
“To succeed in any activity, first there should be motivation. People should undergo challenges to achieve their goal”.
Sosina is one of several women who benefited from the job creation pilot project launched by the Ethiopian Women Federation in collaboration with Addis Ababa Women and Children Affairs Office.
Tsige Hailu another woman engaged in her own business said in the past she travelled to work in Lebanon to change her and her family’s life. Three years after returning home, she was still unemployed. By now she is running a small business in vending coffee through traditional coffee making ceremony.
They started the current business in small initial capital and their business is doing well at this time. She is also working such business in collaboration with her collogue. They have got training first before they start such business, she added.
Addis Ababa City Women and Children Affairs Office said women in the city are getting jobs in modern shops that are located in areas frequented by many people.
Office Head Almaz Abraha told The Ethiopian Herald that about 350 women are getting benefit by working in pairs in a single shop. Association of People with Disability, Women Authors Association, and Firewood Carrying Women Association are among the beneficiaries. The job creation work focused only on women that are the poorest of the poor, has physical disability or those who are repatriates, she added.
“Benefiting women means benefiting the entire society and changing family life as a whole” she said concerning the reason for the due attention given to empowering women economically.
Totally 30 kiosks are constructed for various business scheme of which 28 are given to two pairs of women where as the rest two are provided to the two associations, she explained.
The women are engaged in the areas of fast food, tea and coffee, cloth and jewelry and created the market linkage with various organizations like Ethio-Telecom and Ethiopian Press Agency.
The pilot project was applied first in areas with hot business transaction like Megenagna, Arat kilo, Piassa and Torhailoch until it was replicated to all directions of the city, according to the office.
By now 7,000 beneficiaries are attending training to engage in their own jobs.
Addis Credit and Saving Association has provided the women a loan that ranges from 10,000 to 50,000 Birr. In the current fiscal year, the city administration has planned to create jobs for over 250,000 youth majority of them being women.
The kiosk shop business runners told The Ethiopian Herald that, they started their work after they have got a month long training regarding customer handling and saving.
The office also makes weekly follow up to make them self-reliant. In this fiscal year they have planned to give jobs for 10,000 women to create sustainable jobs and to improve their livelihood in the city.
The Ethiopian Herald September 20, 2019
BY MISGANAW ASNAKE
