An Afghan woman cooks at a bakery in Kandahar city, southern Afghanistan, Feb. 20, 2022.Photo:Xinhua

 

An Afghan woman cooks at a bakery in Kandahar city, southern Afghanistan, Feb. 20, 2022.Photo:Xinhua

 
Used to ask for alms on streets in Afghanistan's Kandahar city, Almasi, a 40-year-old widow, has got a job in a bakery established to create job opportunities for the needy, especially women like her.

"Since (I) began working here and earning money, I've been very happy," Almasi said.

Women in Kandahar, locals said, have been facing economic hardship, particularly the widows who had lost their husbands and bread earners during decades of war.

With the prevailing poverty ravaging the war-torn country, Tamana's husband left Afghanistan to find a job but has sent "unfortunately no good news so far."

Nearly three months ago, Tamana found a job in the bakery and felt satisfied with her income.

Launching income-generating projects, even a small one to hire a handful of people, can contribute to poverty alleviation, she said.

The bakery was started by Hedayatullah Azizi, a member of the local business company the Azizi Group, who believes that creating job opportunities for needy people could help reduce poverty in Kandahar province and in Afghanistan at large.

"Extreme poverty and an increasing number of beggars, especially women, on streets ... has inspired me to help them to have a regular income," Azizi said.

To provide job opportunities, the businessman established a relatively big bakery in Kandahar city, the capital of southern Kandahar province, and employed 50 women.

"A total of 5,000 bread are baked every day there in the bakery," said Azizi, who is also the manager of Azizi Super Store in Kandahar city, adding that the bread was sold to "government offices, houses and other places."

This is the first time that a local company has established an income-generating project in Kandahar, a city that had been badly damaged during the 20-year presence of US-led forces in Afghanistan.

Following the US military defeat and withdrawal from Afghanistan in late August last year, Washington has imposed sanctions on the Taliban-run administration and frozen more than 9 billion US dollars of assets of Afghanistan's central bank, which battered the economy in the war-torn country.

More than 22 million out of some 35 million people in Afghanistan, according to aid agencies reports, are facing acute food insecurity, but a bakery like Azizi's has provided a sliver of hope.