Shayesta, 18, mother of a kid lives in Yakatoot, a village of Dehdadi district, Balkh province. She says “I got married in a young age [17 years old] and my husband used to be agricultural farmer but now is working as a labour in Mazar-e-Sharif. We flee the war and left everything behind”. Shayesta is one of hundreds of the families who flee from Faryab due to war and conflict; these families left everything behind and are now struggling to earn a living.
HiH Af with support of GIZ covers 1,500 returnees and IDPs under “Creating future economic prospect for reintegration of returnees and IDPs in north and north-eastern region of Afghanistan through the layers poultry value chain” project.
Shayesta was mobilized and trained in poultry, she says “although I knew about poultry traditionally, but I learnt more in training including diseases and running a poultry farm in our backyard”.
After successful completion of the training, Shayesta built her chicken coop with guidance of HiH Af trainers and received 25 layer chickens, chicken feed, feeder and other necessary tools to establish her micro-enterprise. She says “In the training, I learnt the importance of ventilation and the proportion between number of chickens and size of the chicken coop, after building the chicken coop I received chicken and tools”.
Now she produces up to 16 eggs daily and it will increase within next month, she sells each egg for AFN 5, she says “I didn’t have any job or knowledge of what to do, now I have a poultry farm and I am earning around AFN 2,400 per month, with this money I am supporting my family to reduce burden on my husband’s shoulders as well as I am saving to expand my business”.
HiH Af has also established associations working as egg collection centers where women sell produced eggs, these associations are linked with retailers in Mazar-e-Sharif market to reduce cost and increase profit of individual entrepreneurs.
