The young entrepreneur bringing financial services to her community in the Wadi Rum desert.
As part of the UNICEF-supported Economic Leadership and Empowerment programme
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In a remote village surrounded by the vast, desert landscape of Wadi Rum, 25-year-old Noor has used her entrepreneurial and leadership skills to start her own microbusiness; bringing much-needed financial services to her community.
Her innovative business idea to bring electronic payments to her village came to life as part of UNICEF and partner Dar Abu Abdullah’s Economic Leadership and Empowerment programme. The programme was designed to bring new opportunities to young people in the south of Jordan, especially young women.
Through her microbusiness, residents of the village can, for the first time, pay for goods and services electronically, without the use of cheques or cash. Noor uses the national E-payment platform to provide the service, charging a small fee. The service has transformed the lives of her neighbours who previously had to drive long distances to the nearest bank.
A woman can be successful and improve her standing in the community through building her skills, being ambitious and finding a job that gives her independence.
The programme, part of UNICEF’s Learning to Earning initiative, gives young people training in leadership skills, including problem solving and effective teamwork, as well as project design, work plan development, financial management, monitoring and quality assurance. After training, young people are encouraged to practice their skills through community initiatives and, finally, a feasibility study and a comprehensive work plan is developed for their microbusiness. Young people are then granted seed funding to implement their entrepreneurial ideas.
Noor wants to see more young women, like her, start their own businesses.
Young people around here have ideas, like everywhere, but there tends not to be many opportunities for them. We need more initiatives like this to generate our own income and the youth of Jordan need to focus more attention on gaining the right skills to match the needs of our economy.
Not only has the programme brought Noor financial independence and the ability to support her family but her confidence has grown exponentially. One change she has noticed: “People in my village look at me differently now."
She hopes that she can be a role model for positive change. “Women should not be stopped from being leaders,” concluded Noor. “It is everyone’s responsibility to eliminate the barriers that hinder girls from reaching their full potential. Achieving this is in the interest of everyone.”
UNICEF’s Economic Leadership and Empowerment programme is generously supported by the Government of Italy, through the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation, the Government of Canada, and the United States Government.
