AFGHANISTAN
Documents & Texts from America.gov
17 January 2008
U.S.-Afghan Women’s Council Investing in Afghanistan’s Future
By David McKeeby
Staff Writer
Washington -- The U.S.-Afghan Women’s Council shows the power of public-private partnerships to transform lives and invest in the future of developing democracies. "The Council shows what individual Americans can do to aid our country's humanitarian efforts in Afghanistan," first lady Laura Bush says.
"It shows what Afghans can do to invest in their country's future," she says.
The council was created in 2002 by President Bush and Afghan President Hamid Karzai to help Afghan women get the skills and education denied to them by the Taliban so that they can fully contribute to Afghanistan’s emergence from decades of war and oppression.
"Through the Council, individual American citizens, mainly women, are making a very personal investment in Afghanistan's women," Laura Bush said January 17 at a council meeting in Washington.
Co-chaired by Under Secretary of State Paula Dobriansky, Afghan Minister of Women's Affairs Hussan Bano Ghazanfar and Minister of Foreign Affairs Rangin Dadfar Spanta, the council has attracted several major corporate supporters, including Time-Warner and Daimler-Chrysler, as well as Microsoft, Gateway and Dell Computers.
Since the toppling of the Taliban in 2001, the first lady said, Afghans already have experienced dramatic improvements in their lives. More people than ever have access to basic health care. Schools have been reopened for more than 5 million children -- including 2 million girls. More than 2,000 kilometers of new roads have helped restart the economy, which has been growing at an average rate of 15 percent per year since 2002.
These developments have brought hope, she said, but much more remains to be done.
"Rural areas lack the basic infrastructure of roads, irrigation and electricity. And, of course, this keeps rural areas remote from education and from economic development," the first lady said. "Many people struggle to provide for the basic human needs of food, clean water and shelter."
A public-private partnership, the council has brought together American business leaders and institutions with Afghan community leaders to channel private donations into concrete projects that change lives for thousands of families across Afghanistan.
Laura Bush highlighted the council’s successes, including the creation of 17 women’s resource centers that provide training ranging from basic literacy to operating a small business; a network of seven community banks offering microfinance loans to as many as 30,000 female entrepreneurs; training to Afghan female judges and lawyers on the country’s new constitution; midwife training allowing more than 1,000 Afghan women to reduce infant mortality levels; and a teacher training institute, supported in part by Microsoft and Dell Computers, to train a new generation of educators.
"One special characteristic of Americans that I think is really important is that Americans genuinely and sincerely want to see other people succeed," she said. "We are encouraged and buoyed by the success of other people -- especially in Afghanistan."
The transcript of Laura Bush’s remarks is available on America.gov.
For more information, see American Giving.
(USINFO is produced by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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