Egypt and Japan signed on Thursday a grant contract worth $83,708 to support the empowerment of Egyptian women.
The signing ceremony was attended by Japan’s ambassador to Egypt Masaki Noke and Ali Mokhtar, chairman of the Gozour Foundation Training Centre.
The grant aims to support women in old Cairo and the surrounding areas by providing vocational training in an attempt to create job opportunities for poor women, according to a statement from the Japanese embassy in Cairo.
It will be used in training women for self-employment besides providing them with specific skills that are compatible with the current needs of the Egyptian labour market in various areas such as cooking and handicrafts.
Trainees of the programme will be educated as well on numerous marketing strategies.
In 2018, Gozour Foundation carried out a programme to support women through a project focused on enhancing their English language and computer competency in order to meet the needs of the labour market and enable them to find suitable jobs.
The empowerment of women has a pivotal role in achieving the goals of sustainable development, the statement quoted Noke as saying. He stressed Japan’s support for women’s empowerment and the promotion of gender equality.
The grant is part of support offered by the Japanese government to human security projects in Egypt, through which it provides funding to non-profit organizations, working in various activities such as health and welfare, education, environment, and vocational training.
The Japanese grant programme was launched in Egypt in 1994. To this day, Japan has carried out 167 projects in Egypt through this programme, at a cost equivalent to about $9 million, the statement said.
Source: Egypt Independent
