News About and From The Business Council for Peace (Bpeace)
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Afghanistan
After Nargis Shearzad had an operation on her leg as a child, a doctor prescribed exercises to help her heal. Thrilled with the results and her healthy new lifestyle, she would open a gym for women years later as an adult. While that might not sound like a revolutionary accomplishment here in the
U.S., it was for Shearzadn, 26, a single woman in Afghanistan.
Outstanding Bpeace Volunteer on the Air on PBS in Lehigh Valley, PA
Lehigh Valley PBS (WLVT-39) featured a segment on Bpeace member Pamela Varkony and her work with Bpeace, and with other organizations, in Afghanistan. Varkony won the Bpeace VERA for "Networker of the Year," and after watching this story you will know why. She's raised money for an Associate's preschool; brought Binney & Smith crayons to Afghanistan so students could draw in color for the first time; raised the funds and made the connections happen so a sick Afghan girl could have a life-saving operation; and mobilized a military operation to get donated medical equipment to Afghan war victims. Varkony's story is about 9 minutes in, but it's worth the wait. (Note: Windows Media Player is necessary to play the video.)
http://webcast.wlvt.org/Tempo2006-07/tempo-423.wmv
The Volunteers: Cut-and-run is not in their vocabulary.
Deputy Editor Daniel Henninger writes:
"Here in the U.S., the political new year will fill up fast enough with politicians and pundits offering ways to unwind and spindle the commitments America made to Iraq and Afghanistan. So this seemed a good moment to revisit the folks running Spirit of America and the Business Council for Peace. They're not going to leave....
"It was about 19 months ago to the day that 13 women from Afghanistan were looking out the windows of the 29th floor of the Empire State Building in midtown Manhattan, brought there by a group of American businesswomen who call themselves the Business Council for Peace (Bpeace). One of the women remarked that New York looked 'very new.' The idea was to expose the Afghans, most of them college graduates, to basic business know-how. Bpeace had identified the Afghans as 'fast runners,' women with entrepreneurial instincts. Kate Buggeln, a Council member and retailing specialist, just returned from Kabul, her fourth trip there. Three other Bpeace women were with her." (For the continuation, click here.)
In a new multimedia feature on The Washington Post website, an extraordinary group of Afghan women entrepreneurs are telling their untold stories, five years after the fall of the Taliban. “The Women of Kabul” profiles five Afghan women that the U.S.-based non-profit Business Council for Peace (Bpeace) is mentoring and training over a three-year period. The multimedia project with images and audio by award-winning photojournalist Paula Lerner can be viewed at the
Washington Post.
Bpeace Member and writer Pamela Varkony contributes occasional essays to NPR's All Things Considered. Her experiences in Afghanistan with Bpeace informed this, which urges the U.S. government to honor its commitments in Afghanistan. To read more of Pam's thoughts on Afghanistan, do check out her blog—you'll be glad you did.
Kate Buggeln writes: "Rebuilding Afghanistan requires local commitment and international support. It also requires sufficient stability in the present so that Afghans can focus on the future. How can we expect Afghans to make the individual commitments and personal investments necessary to reconstruct their country when not only does continuing instability exist but also its source is an unchecked next-door neighbor? If the situation remains unchanged, the Afghan citizenry will become merely observers in the international community's expensive and then likely doomed efforts to rebuild their nation."
Here's Why I'm Going Back to Afghanistan
Op-Ed By Kate Buggeln, Bpeace Member
"'YOU'RE NOT going back over there, are you?'' I get asked that question a lot these days because 'there' is Kabul, Afghanistan, and my mother, among others, doesn't like what she has been reading lately, particularly about the suicide bombings.
"In December, for a fourth time, my volunteer work for the not-for-profit Business Council for Peace (www.bpeace.org) will bring me back to Kabul, where indeed the news has been grim. Over the past few weeks I have awoken each morning to read the overnight emails from Bpeace associates, Afghan friends and contacts. They write of road-side bombs, rocket attacks and of Taliban notices warning women not to leave their homes. Our Bpeace associates are frightened for the first time since the fall of the Taliban, and some are putting plans for the future on hold."
"ACTION FIGURES: Nargis Shearzad. Survival of the Fittest," by Pamela Varkony; Women's Health magazine, September 2006 issue.
An article about Afghan Associate Nargis, who has pioneered a women's gym in Kabul, appears in the September 2006 issue of WOMEN’S HEALTH. It includes Nargis' inspiring story, and her involvement with Bpeace. The article was written by Bpeace member Pam Varkony—who met Nargis during the April 2006 mission—and is illustrated by photos by Bpeace member Paula Lerner.
From the article:
"A heavy gold curtain is pulled across the glass doors of a three-story building in the heart of downtown Kabul. There's no sign outside, but local women know what's hidden here. It's Venus, one of the capital's first women-only gyms, founded by fitness lover Nargis Shearzad. When a fall nearly crippled her at age 3, Shearzad's family created a makeshift physical-therapy routine to teach her to walk again. It worked so well, she became an avid runner. "I knew exercise was the secret to staying pain-free," she says. In early 2005, just 4 years after the United States ousted the Taliban from Kabul, Shearzad decided to do something her female relatives wouldn't have considered in their wildest dreams: open a gym."
Forbes.com
Pantone Donates Color Guides to Afghanistan's Women Entrepreneurs
The Business Council for Peace (Bpeace), a global nonprofit coalition of businesspeople volunteering to help women in war-torn countries grow sustainable businesses, today announced a significant in-kind donation from Pantone of more than two dozen color and planning guides. The guides are being immediately deployed in Afghanistan to train women entrepreneurs in the fashion and home accessory industries to use color communication guides and color forecasting books for local design and production.
Wall Street Journal Editorial Page
Giving Afghanistan the Business: U.S. "involvement" is about more than POW camps.
"Gathered that Sunday morning in a conference room on the 29th floor of the Empire State Building were about 10 women from the Business Council for Peace and 13 women from Afghanistan, who arrived the previous evening. Standing at the window, with New York spread to the horizon, one Afghan woman announced that it looked "very new." The woman next to her captured it with a camcorder. The tourists, however, were standing outside on the sidewalk; these Afghan women were here on business."
Business Week Online
Peace Through Entrepreneurship
A talk with Bpeace's Toni Maloney on the group's efforts to mentor small-business women from war-torn areas like Afghanistan.
Roanoke Times
Stitch in the right direction
Laura Bradford, a Bpeace member and Roanoke handbag designer has ties to an embroidery business owner in Afghanistan.
The Journal News
Reaching around the world to lend a helping hand
"Ask Laurie Chock for her perceptions of the recent business trip she took to Kabul, and the Irvington resident will tell you she's still processing the eventful week she spent in the Afghanistan capital. 'It's really grueling there,' she says, 'from the climate to the lack of infrastructure to the temperature to the pollution.' Nevertheless, Chock, who owns her own communication consulting-and-training business, Chock Communications, speaks enthusiastically of the work she and six others initiated there a week ago. As a member of the Business Council for Peace, based in Manhattan, Chock traveled to the war-torn country to help interview 40 Afghan women to determine which of them had the potential to start or expand their own businesses."
Rwanda
Donors at the Second Annual Bpeace Gala in May contributed to build
on a seed grant from United Business Media and fund computers,
English and computer lessons for all Bpeace Associates in Afghanistan
and Rwanda. Within three weeks, 21 laptops were delivered to our
Rwanda Associates. At least three are already connected to the
Internet. Read the Rwanda New Times coverage of this story.
In covering the anniversary of the Rwandan genocide, CBS Sixty Minutes profiled Bpeace Associate Immaculee Ilibagiza. Immaculee recounted her horrific tale of hiding from killers for 91 days in a tiny bathroom with a group of other women. Immaculee, says 60 Minutes, "is speaking out now to prevent further atrocities, not only in Rwanda, but in Darfur and other places where massacres loom on the horizon."
Parade Magazine
Rwandans Weave Love
"Ten years ago, nearly a million Rwandans died in just 100 days when Hutu tribesmen began a campaign of genocide against members of the Tutsi tribe. Rwanda's population is now 56% women, half of them widows. As many as 60% of the women may have AIDS. In the face of such despair, a group of widows from both tribes banded together to form an association called Avega. Its members weave "love baskets" to symbolize the need for healing in their nation and to help support themselves and Rwanda's many orphans. (In one rural village, Gasshoga, the entire population of 300 survives solely on funds from the baskets.) The Business Council for Peace, made up of international businesswomen, offered its help and arranged to market the baskets. "
Marie Claire
A Country of Women
"Warring tribes thriving under the same roof: Is it possible? Amber Chand traveled to Rwanda to learn the lessons of the women who survived a civil war -- and came together to build a peaceful future."
SocialFunds.com
Give Peace a Chance: Support Women in Business
"'It's hard to talk about peace if your family is hungry and you can't earn a living,' said Toni Maloney, a member of the BCP governing board and president of The Maloney Group, a strategic marketing consultancy. 'Our mission is to help women start sustainable businesses, to place them in a better position to foster peace initiatives.'"
Los Angeles, CA - (July 2007) — New York-based volunteer network Bpeace (The Business Council for Peace) hosted a unique event in Mill Valley, California on Saturday, June 30th 2007 to raise awareness for their economic development programs taking place half-way across the world in Afghanistan.
April 16, 2007: The first new schools, shops and hotels are exciting in any new community, but in war-torn areas such as Rwanda and Afghanistan, they are the literal lifeline to peace and stability. Tangible evidence of peace-building results when women create businesses and community employment possibilities. When women are strong economically, they can sustain their families and strengthen their voices for peace. One organization creating results and supporting women in this way in Rwanda and Afghanistan is the Business Council for Peace (Bpeace). An online auction (www.bidforpeace.cmarket.com) and the second annual Gala to be held in New York on Wednesday, May 9, 2007, will raise funds for this important peace work.
December 5, 2006, Kabul, Afghanistan and New York, NY -- The Business Council for Peace (Bpeace) today announced a nationwide Afghanistan talent competition in search of Afghan businesswomen in non-traditional industries to participate in on-the-job training in U.S. “The Bpeace Apprentice Road Trip” is an unprecedented opportunity for Afghan businesswomen to gain practical experience in the U.S. in their chosen industries. Bpeace will bring 12 Afghan women entrepreneurs working in non-traditional and non-handicraft industries to the US in 2008 for three-week internships and apprenticeships with different firms.
"In a new multimedia feature on The Washington Post website, an extraordinary group of Afghan women entrepreneurs are telling their untold stories, five years after the fall of the Taliban. “The Women of Kabul” profiles five Afghan women that the U.S.-based non-profit Business Council for Peace (Bpeace) is mentoring and training over a three-year period. The multimedia project with images and audio by award-winning photojournalist Paula Lerner can be viewed at the
Washington Post."
"Senior executives from New York's textile and apparel businesses joined forces in an accelerated development program for 12 Afghan women entrepreneurs - hailing from Kabul, Kandahar and Herat. The "Style Road Trip" exposed these apparel and accessory entrepreneurs to the demands of the global marketplace through real world and classroom experiences. The three week program included visits to designers such as Tracy Reese, Eileen Fisher, Cynthia Steffe, Donna Karan, Behnaz Sarafpour and M Z WALLACE, store visits to retailers such as dressbarn and ABC Carpet & Home, and class work at the Fashion Institute of Technology."
August, 2006
INTERNATIONAL ALERT — a London-based organization that works to build sustainable peace in areas affected or threatened by violent conflict — has released a white paper entitled Local Business, Local Peace, which significantly features the work of Bpeace. The publication seeks to draw attention to the potential of local businesses in conflict areas (including Afghanistan, Bosnia and Herzegovnia, Colombia, and Somalia) to build peace. It pays special attention to the role of women entrepreneurs in these efforts.
From the report:
"Bpeace has 19 Afghan fast runners, employing over 400 Afghans in various industries, including apparel, construction, hospitality, consulting services and physical fitness. By supporting women who have already leapt the hurdle of providing sustenance and schooling for their families, Bpeace hopes to impact on a wider circle of Afghans whose livelihoods depend on these women. Each Afghan associate has a mentor who supports her in growing her business. Mentors are experienced businesspeople and Bpeace members in the United States, Europe and Canada. They help associates write business plans, access finance and connect with retailers for their products. Fast runners have participated in a series of business and technical training courses conducted by Bpeace volunteers in Afghanistan and New York. As associates move into year two, Bpeace continues to provide advanced training and mentoring while casting a net for a second group of businesswomen."
This Bpeace-authored study presents a primer on Afghanistan offering economic and social information from both an historical and current perspective:
- Validation of the work that Bpeace is currently undertaking and the methodology by which we are approaching current issues.
- Recommendations for future strategic moves such as identifying fast runners at an earlier age; embracing/accepting men into the program as a means to further support businesswomen and to recognize their role in family businesses; and targeting leapfrog industries/businesses.
- Inspiration to stimulate Bpeace members and friends to play an active and meaningful role in our mission of helping the women of Afghanistan build sustainable businesses.
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