Anissa Mohamed, 22, was born and raised in Hadhow, a small town located 25 kilometers away from Jigjiga, the capital of the Somali State. Anissa was enjoying her life until she found herself in a forced marraige before completing high school, which was a norm in her community.
Then, she became a young mother looking after her three children. Anissa had no choice but to stay at home to take care of her children and depend on her husband’s income. Life became unbearbale, it defeintly took a wrong turn and it proved tough to change the situation.
In 2017, Anissa was recruited to enroll in transferable life skills training based on the criteria set to identify target youth. Participating in training was a game-changer for her. She immediately received practical skills and knowledge. Soon after completing the first phase of the training, Anissa got coaching support from youth facilitators who prepared her personal development plan.
In the middle of 2017, based on her personal development plan, Anissa started her first business, which was vegetables sales for local market. She was buying vegetables from the farmers and reselling them to customers with a small profit margin. Soon, she realized that the vegetable business was viable only to save some money as a deposit to get a bigger loan.
After saving for a while, Anissa met the requirement of 20 percent minimum deposit to secure a loan from the local micro financial institutions, a loan that was three times greater than her savings. After she carefully studied her community by using the community mapping skills she learned in the Transferable Life Skills Training, she transformed her business into a small restaurant and started selling oil and lubricants for light vehicles in her town.
Currently she is serving breakfast and lunch in partnership with her friend Muluka Mahammad, and she sells oil for local Bajaj drivers. She said that “success is not something that you bring it in one night; it needs patient”. She earns 4,800 Birr per month in total and plans to expand her business in near future.
Annisa’s story is one of the many success story that came out of USAID’s Building the Potential of Youth Activity program that was launched in 2015, and which is implemented by Save the Children and its partner.
The goal of the program is to assist unemployed and underemployed youth between the age 15 to 29 to attain skills, knowledge, and social capital that lead to increased income and economic self-sufficiency, with a particular focus on young men and women.
This will be addressed by increasing youths’ access to skill building and employment promotion services through different schemes.
Genet Lemma, Chief of Party at the USAID said that it has been more than four years since the program to empower and guide Ethiopian youth towards self-reliance started. It has been a period full of learning, achievements, challenges and remarkable experiences, she added.
In the six implementation regions the team capitalized on a variety of available opportunities to create a youth friendly enabling environment. “Community leaders, the private sector, individuals, governmental and nongovernmental stakeholders all played a vital role in our support to young people”, she said.
The program is helping young men with various addiction problems as well.
Hati Nur, 25, lives in Sardo kebele of the Afar region in Ethiopia. He dropped out of school in the second grade for economic reasons, and his family could not provide sufficient resources for his development. His situation became worse as an adult. He remained jobless and dependent on his poor parents, spending most of his time sitting idle on the roadsides of the village.
Since he felt depressed and hopeless, Hati became a drug addict and a cigarette smoker. Fortunately, Hati found help from his relatives, who advised him to attend the transferable life skills training. The local selection committee considered his situation and invited him to join the program, which could provide the urgent support he needed to drastically improve his situation.
Hati took the basic work readiness training, designed for those youth with less literacy and numeracy skills. After gaining basic knowledge about work skills, Hati attended the other complementary training as well, which helped him enhance his understanding of effective communication, savings and time management, and other basic skills.
Inspired by these trainings, Hati then decided to set up his own business. With the help of his family, he raised a startup capital of 3,000 Birr and started some petty trade in a small shop in his village. His hard work paid off, and Hati was making some profit and saving money. Later, he bought a three-wheel light vehicle (Bajaj) and started a transportation business. Now, Hati owns his Bajaj and has 30,000 Birr in his bank account, and he has plans to expand his business in the near future.
The Ministry of Women, Children and Youth has led this effort to support youth to change their lives meaningfully and cascade the learning and best practices of the Activity. By the end of 2019, these activities will build the economic self-sufficiency of 34,537 youth across 30 woredas of Afar, Amhara, Oromia, SNNPR, Somali, and Tigray Regions.
The Ethiopian Herald November13, 2019
BY HAILE DEMEKE
