Hawa Jana 56 year old living in Qadeem village of Sholgara district, Balkh province and has 6 sons and 2 daughters. She is living with her 2 sons who are 16 and 18 because her other four sons and two daughters are married and living separately. Her husband died five years ago therefore the responsibility of the family was on her shoulders.
She says, “life was difficult, me and my two younger sons were dependent on my married sons and they also had a lot of financial problems, therefore I did not expect much from them and I used to work at the neighbors’ houses such as cleaning and clothes washing to earn some money.”
She joined Mahtab self-help group when the project started in Qadeem village. She received Group Management, Business Development Services (BDS) and beekeeping skills training. HiH Af provided her with a honey beehive and beekeeping tools to enable her start her beekeeping microenterprise.
She was very happy when she collected honey for the first time. She collected 12 kg honey and sold 9 kg for AFN 9,000 and used the other three kg in the family and it was the first time her sons tasted honey. She said, “a few months ago I never thought I will be able to produce honey and earn money. I am thankful to my trainers and Hand in Hand that supported us financially.”
Hawa Jana is looking forward to expanding her business and she wants her sons to be engaged in this work and make a bigger family business for themselves.