Nari Jibon: Women's Lives
Bangladesh is a small South Asian country situated on the east coast of India. An estimated 150 million people live in a land area the size of Wisconsin. Natural disasters, political instability and corruption have plagued the country since its birth in a bloody War for Indepence in 1971. While many advances in population health and education have been made in the past decades, Bangladesh still struggles with high unemployment rates and few work opportunities for women.
In Bangladesh, the many women workers are employed as garment workers, domestic workers, or sex workers. These jobs are typically low-paid and highly insecure. Nari Jibon is working to provide women with alternative work skills so that they can begin to work in other areas.
The Nari Jibon office is located in Malibagh, Chowdhurypara, Dhaka, on three floors of an apartment building. One floor houses a tailoring shop and women-only cyber cafe, another floor has classrooms, and the third floor contains the research cell. Students come from surrounding houses, slums and area universities in order to receive low-cost, high-quality training in Bangla, English, Computers and Tailoring.
Since the its doors opened in March 2005, Nari Jibon has graduated many students from various training programs. Students have gone on to receive promotions, get hired at new jobs, start businesses, or return to formal schooling for further education.
