Female entrepreneurs on the rise in male-dominated Kirkuk
By Pishtiwan Jamal
KIRKUK, Kurdistan Region - When Fairouz Nasih started her own business in Kirkuk in the mid-1970s, little did she know that one day she her work would open new doors for women in the city.
Four decades later, her small sewing shop has turned into a design institute that gives complete courses in fashion, and even finds jobs for its graduates.
Nasih still remembers when she opened her very modest store in her poor neighborhood in 1974.
“I think everybody was shocked when they first heard that I ran a shop of my own,” Fairouz, now in her 60s, told Rudaw.
“I was very young, but I was extremely ambitious too, so after a while I rented a bigger place and continued from there,” said the woman, who currently owns her own fashion academy in Kirkuk.
Much has changed in the last decade with regard to women’s access to the labor market, as Iraq went through unprecedented economic growth, exclusively due to the money-spinning oil industry, which for now has declined as prices have dramatically plummeted.
According to the Kirkuk chamber of commerce and industry, of the nearly 25,000 business owners in the city, 1637 are registered by women, a relatively high number compared to other Kurdish cities.
“Almost all of these women have their small or large businesses and work on a project without being interrupted by their male relatives,” Sabahaddin Sallayi, head of the chamber, told Rudaw.
Sallayi said that, although many of the women are engaged in modern fashion and the clothing businesses, they work in a relatively safe environment, with no threats from radical groups.
With well over $100 billion annually from oil revenues between 2005 and 2014, the Iraqi government started mass employment of especially young people and women who possessed college degrees.
According to Iraq’s ministry of finance, over $5 billion has gone to government employees in salaries and pensions per month since 2005, including in the Kurdistan region.
Nearly 80 percent of all employed women and 45 percent of all the employed men in Kurdistan work for the government, according to data provided by the Kurdistan region’s statistics office.
But the overall number of men on government payroll is considerably higher than women -- 65 to 35 percent.
Although men still have the lion’s share of the salaries in both numbers and size, yet an unprecedented female workforce entered the market over the past 10 years, says Songul Chapok, the head of a businesswomen’s association in Iraq.
Chapok owns a consulting firm in Baghdad and works as an advisor to several companies in Kirkuk and other Iraqi cities.
She represented her fellow Turkmen in the country’s legislative council in Baghdad in 2003.
“There are women who have their companies and some even have more than one job, but the majority of women who have private businesses are still engaged in more traditionally female works, such as clothe and sewing and makeup,” she said.
KIRKUK, Kurdistan Region - When Fairouz Nasih started her own business in Kirkuk in the mid-1970s, little did she know that one day she her work would open new doors for women in the city.
Four decades later, her small sewing shop has turned into a design institute that gives complete courses in fashion, and even finds jobs for its graduates.
Nasih still remembers when she opened her very modest store in her poor neighborhood in 1974.
“I think everybody was shocked when they first heard that I ran a shop of my own,” Fairouz, now in her 60s, told Rudaw.
“I was very young, but I was extremely ambitious too, so after a while I rented a bigger place and continued from there,” said the woman, who currently owns her own fashion academy in Kirkuk.
Much has changed in the last decade with regard to women’s access to the labor market, as Iraq went through unprecedented economic growth, exclusively due to the money-spinning oil industry, which for now has declined as prices have dramatically plummeted.
According to the Kirkuk chamber of commerce and industry, of the nearly 25,000 business owners in the city, 1637 are registered by women, a relatively high number compared to other Kurdish cities.
“Almost all of these women have their small or large businesses and work on a project without being interrupted by their male relatives,” Sabahaddin Sallayi, head of the chamber, told Rudaw.
Sallayi said that, although many of the women are engaged in modern fashion and the clothing businesses, they work in a relatively safe environment, with no threats from radical groups.
With well over $100 billion annually from oil revenues between 2005 and 2014, the Iraqi government started mass employment of especially young people and women who possessed college degrees.
According to Iraq’s ministry of finance, over $5 billion has gone to government employees in salaries and pensions per month since 2005, including in the Kurdistan region.
Nearly 80 percent of all employed women and 45 percent of all the employed men in Kurdistan work for the government, according to data provided by the Kurdistan region’s statistics office.
But the overall number of men on government payroll is considerably higher than women -- 65 to 35 percent.
Although men still have the lion’s share of the salaries in both numbers and size, yet an unprecedented female workforce entered the market over the past 10 years, says Songul Chapok, the head of a businesswomen’s association in Iraq.
Chapok owns a consulting firm in Baghdad and works as an advisor to several companies in Kirkuk and other Iraqi cities.
She represented her fellow Turkmen in the country’s legislative council in Baghdad in 2003.
“There are women who have their companies and some even have more than one job, but the majority of women who have private businesses are still engaged in more traditionally female works, such as clothe and sewing and makeup,” she said.