Women’s economy for the development of economic projects

This is an English translation of a Kurdish language report first published by the Women’s Economy Committee of Kongra Star Women’s Movement in North and East Syria on 19 May, 2022

As the harvest season approaches, the women’s economy in North and East Syria takes the necessary measures to protect agricultural products.

With the beginning of the Rojava revolution in the North and East of Syria, the role of women emerged in the economic field, as well as in other areas, and confronted the male mentality that has a negative effect on the role of women. This mentality stole all material and spiritual opportunities, but the woman started to recover her opportunities through the ideas and philosophy of Leader Abdullah Ocelan, which leads the society towards a communal economy.

These developments were not only for economic empowerment, but also for supporting the labour force that needs to work and for empowering women in the economic field, equality between the sexes, economic development of communities and sustainable development.

Armanc Mihemed, Spokeswoman of the Women’s Economic Committee of Kongra Star, said, “As we know, this is the time of harvest, land cultivation and irrigation. The yield is good, even though we really had a year with many risks on the land, especially due to the lack of sufficient rain at the required time, and this risk was also on agriculture, economy and society. We, as women’s economy, found it necessary to protect this agricultural land, and as well as to protect the society from disasters that are the result of these dangers. Necessary measures should be taken. We know what the lack of rain has caused, so we irrigate the agricultural fields with wheat and corn to feed ourselves in the community.”

“In order for women to go to work and to develop the economic society, we open agricultural projects for women and women work in them. The purpose of these projects is to develop an autonomous women’s economy in society. The aim is to build the independence of women who work in these projects.

About the economic projects of the Women’s Economic Committee of Kongra Star, Armanc Mihemed said, “The agricultural projects that our committee manages are distributed in Derik, Terbespi, Dirbêsiyê, Raqqa, and we are also in charge of opening and developing projects in the Shehba district. The goal of all these projects is to break the economic monopoly and prevent private exploitation.”

To close her speech, Armanc Muhammad drew attention to the economic crisis caused by the lack of rain and said, “When there is less rain, this creates a general threat to society, so the Economic Committee is always looking for alternatives and solutions for the lack of rain, and to find the answer to these problems and disasters”.