KUNAR PROVINCE, Afghanistan – Members of the Kunar Female Engagement Team and the Iowa National Guard’s 734th Agribusiness Development Team conducted a foot patrol, April 11, to Isara, a village in the Marawara District, to assess the effectiveness of a program that is teaching 12 Afghan women to make clothes there.
“We gathered a wealth of information from the students that tells us the program is doing just what we set out to do,” said U.S. Army Sgt. 1st Class Melissa Brumley, of Stuart, Iowa, the human resources noncommissioned officer in charge for the ADT, who is managing the sewing project for the FET.
According to Brumley, the Isara site is one of two locations in the Marawara District the FET selected for identical projects. Each sewing project, she said, furnishes a hand-cranked sewing machine, supplies, material and instruction to 12 women selected by the Kunar Province Directorate of Women’s Affairs at a cost of just under $5,000 per site.
When Brumley and other FET members inspected the Isara location of the sewing project, they questioned the students about the quality of instruction and suitability of project materials. The students responded animatedly, and the room was soon buzzing with two-way conversation in English and Pashto.
“They were all so eager to tell us how much they’re learning,” said U.S. Army Maj. Mary Parmenter of Perry, Iowa, operations officer for the ADT and leader of the Kunar FET. “They couldn’t wait to show us the patterns they were making, and you could see a real progression from their first garments to the clothes they’re making now.”
One of the most vocal students was young woman named Murgai, who led Parmenter outside to show her the material that would go into the next garment Murgai planned to make. She also thanked Parmenter for providing the sewing training.
“Before this class, I had no way to make any money for my family,” Murgai said. “Now I will be able to sell clothes in my village, and people will not have to go the bazaar to buy them.”
However, the sewing instructor, Farida, told the members of the FET the program had not gone perfectly, and she made specific recommendations for improvements.
“The students need more thread, and they also need more fuel to heat irons,” Farida said. “There should also be money if a sewing machine breaks. That happened in this class, and I had to pay 400 afs (about $9) to have it fixed.”
Brumley jotted down Farida’s suggestions and thanked her for the candid feedback.
“We’re getting ready to start two more projects just like this, and getting this information first-hand is exactly why we came here,” Brumley said. “This will help us modify our proposals so we can do it even better next time.”
Parmenter pointed out the sewing project is just one of several being undertaken by the Kunar FET to improve the economic condition of women in the province.
“We already have a soap-making program and a small poultry production program, and we’ve got programs in the works for small-scale goat milk and cheese production and honey production, all of which is sustainable by these women after we leave,” Parmenter said. “The goal is to have women with different skills producing their own products in several different villages, so no single village gets saturated with the same product.”