US embassy cable - 05AMMAN6529

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 AMMAN 006529 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR G/IWI, EB, DRL 
STATE ALSO FOR NEA/PI 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: SOCI, KWMN, ECON, EFIN, JO 
SUBJECT: Jordanian Businesswomen Tackle Gender Barriers 
 
 
1.  SUMMARY:  Over the past decade, women's ability to 
succeed in Jordan's private sector has improved.  Although 
financial and social barriers are still present, the 
establishment of business and gender-focused organizations 
combined with a general optimism suggest that many Jordanian 
businesswomen believe they can overcome gender barriers. 
However, it remains the case that only women with 
exceptionally supportive families have a chance to succeed 
in business here. 
END SUMMARY. 
 
2.  Jordanian businesswomen come from all socio-economic 
classes and are most commonly found in the industry sectors 
producing jewelry, garments, cosmetics, food, and 
handicrafts.  Prominent women succeed in other sectors as 
well; examples include Randa Ayoubi, the founder and CEO of 
the IT company Rubicon; Luna Madi, founder of the Jordan 
division of the regional PR company Headlines; and Khawla Al 
Sheikh Hourani, a licensed plumber and successful agent for 
water saving devices (WSD).  Women operate nearly two-thirds 
of all informal businesses - businesses operated out of the 
home - in Jordan. 
 
3.  As of May 2005, only 11.8% of women in Jordan are 
economically active compared to 64% of men.  Of these 
numbers, 19.7% of economically active women are unemployed, 
whereas 12.3% of economically active men are unemployed.  Of 
married women, only 9.8% are economically active with a 1.2% 
unemployment rate, compared to non-married women, where 
15.7% are economically active with a 4.2% unemployment rate. 
 
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WOMEN HINDERED BY LACK OF CAPITAL, COLLATERAL 
--------------------------------------------- 
 
4.  One of the chief hurdles for women on the path to 
entrepreneurship is financing.  While difficulty obtaining 
loans is a problem facing both genders in Jordan, it tends 
to affect women to a greater degree because they are, at the 
outset, less wealthy than men.  According to a Jordan Forum 
for Business and Professional Women (JFBPW) study of local 
Jordanian banks (not including Standard Chartered Bank), 
women own only 10% of all the money saved in bank accounts. 
Jordan's inheritance law, which follows traditional Sunni 
sharia law, also contributes to this unequal distribution of 
wealth, as the legal minimum that women must inherit from 
their fathers' estates is smaller than their brothers' 
shares.  (If a father makes out a will, he is free to leave 
a daughter an equal share, but this is not usually the 
case).  Moreover, families reportedly often pressure women 
to give their share of an estate to a brother in return for 
his care and support.  With fewer options for capital and 
collateral, women's chances of obtaining loans from 
commercial banks are reduced. 
 
5.  Yet there are a number of opportunities for women to 
overcome these financial barriers.  Microfund for Women 
(MFW), formerly supported by USAID's AMIR (Achievement of 
Market-Friendly Initiatives and Results) program, was 
established to help finance women who had small informal 
businesses and whose lack of collateral or credit history 
prevented them from obtaining loans.  As of December 2004, 
MFW had disbursed 120,602 loans to 40,753 Jordanians (98.07% 
of them women), many of whom were repeat borrowers with 
successful repayment histories.  Jordanian businesswomen 
benefit from other microfinance institutions in Jordan: 
Jordan Micro Credit company (JMCC), Middle East Micro Credit 
Company (MEMCC), and Ahli Micro Credit Company (AMC).  As of 
June 2005, women-owned businesses received 80.07% of all 
microfinance loans distributed by MFW, JMCC, MEMCC, and AMC. 
In addition, women made up 93.56% of repeat clients. 
 
6.  Another opportunity is available through business 
incubator  programs, such as those sponsored by JFBPW, which 
provide new  entrepreneurs with an office and the basic 
supplies to begin a business.  However, JFBPW currently can 
support only 14 women at a time in its incubators, although 
it plans to expand.  AID supports a program called "Women's 
Access to Entrepreneurship Development and Training" 
(WAEDAT), which aims to help women obtain loans by providing 
connections, assistance, and advice on how to apply. 
 
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PERCEIVED SOCIAL BARRIERS 
------------------------- 
 
7.  Women in Jordan frequently refer to the presence of 
social barriers and stigmas against women in the business 
world.  One such perceived barrier is that Jordan's chiefly 
a traditional patriarchal society in which males are the 
dominant gender and the disproportionate holders of power. 
As explained by Randa Qubti, founder of the Bawabet Al Sharq 
for Handicrafts business, this negatively affects women in 
the market-place when such "patriarchal values" favor men 
over women simply because they are men.  Another perceived 
barrier is the widespread prejudice that women are, by 
nature, too emotional to run a business and earn a profit. 
According to WAEDAT program coordinator Wejdan Abu Lail, the 
fear is that if a woman is too emotional she will sympathize 
with her clients and run her business like a charity 
operation instead of a profit-making enterprise.  There also 
seemed to be a general agreement that a glass ceiling exists 
in Jordanian corporations, where it is unusual to find women 
in senior positions. 
 
8.  However, some businesswomen told Embassy intern that 
they personally have not experienced any barriers as women 
competing in the Jordanian business sector.  Randa Ayoubi of 
IT Rubicon believes the barriers she faced were due to the 
general unawareness of the IT field in the 1990s, and not 
due to her gender.  Two foreign businesswomen who operate 
garment factories in the Al-Tajamouat Industrial estate, one 
a naturalized Jordanian citizen and the other a Turkish 
citizen, also claimed they face no gender barriers in 
Jordanian business.  Most of these women did acknowledge, 
however, that they were lucky to have modern families that 
supported their business endeavors.  Many women also tell us 
that social barriers are erected by women themselves, and 
can be overcome with motivation and self-confidence. 
 
9.  Working to overcome these barriers are many 
organizations that offer business development, skills 
training, networking, mentoring, and education programs to 
increase women's competitiveness, thereby reducing the 
impact of social barriers.  For example, Jordan-US Business 
Partnership (JUSBP), soon to be known as the Business 
Development Center (BDC), organized a national volunteer 
council that provides mentors for new entrepreneurs and 
launched a series of seminars and conferences aimed at 
increasing the competitiveness of women-owned businesses in 
Jordan.  WAEDAT provides each client with core business 
skills, advisor visits and follow-up, sub and cross-sector 
training opportunities, mentorship in cooperation with the 
Young Entrepreneurs Association (YEA), and networking events 
that enhance the business development.  In addition to the 
incubator projects, JFBPW offers technical assistance, legal 
awareness programs, and political advocacy for women's 
increased involvement in decision-making activities.  Other 
organizations working to improve women's involvement in 
Jordanian business include INJAZ, an organization focusing 
on youth entrepreneurship and economic activity; the Royal 
Society for the Conservation of Nature, which creates jobs 
for women who live in Jordan's nature reserves; and the 
Jordan River Foundation through its Community Empowerment 
Program (CEP). 
 
10.  These organizations have proved to be successful over 
the past several years in their efforts to improve women's 
business involvement.  JUSBP, a non-gender specific 
organization, intends to increase its focus on women-owned 
businesses once it becomes the Jordan-focused BDC.  Since 
its establishment in 1976, JFBPW has expanded from a legal 
awareness group to include an information and communication 
center, the woman's enterprise center which houses the 
incubation project, and will soon open the first brokerage 
firm run by women for women in the Middle East on September 
1.  It will cater to businesswomen and 20% of the profits 
will go towards expansion of JFBPW.  JFBPW also recently 
received a grant from USAID's AMIR program to expand its 
research and information analysis programs.  WAEDAT, a much 
younger organization, has also shown signs of success since 
its establishment in 2004.  With the assistance of WAEDAT 
training packages, participants have achieved a 25% overall 
increase in sales and a 10% increase in employment.  WAEDAT 
plans to assist at least 270 women by mid-2006 and expand 
its programs to reach women more widely in Jordan, including 
Aqaba in the south, and Ajloun and Balqa in the northwest. 
 
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SIGNIFICANCE OF FAMILY SUPPORT 
------------------------------ 
 
11.  The presence of family support is a significant factor 
in a businesswoman's successful business venture.  In fact, 
one of the characteristics of the WAEDAT target group is 
that she has her family's support, meaning they encourage 
her and "accept the idea of her starting a business." 
Program director Wijdan Abu Leil told Embassy intern that 
there is little WAEDAT can do if the family does not support 
a woman's business endeavors. 
 
12.  Few businesswomen specifically mentioned the importance 
of family support to women's success generally, but the 
majority referred to it as playing an important role in 
their success personally.  Wijdan Talhouni Saket, President 
of JFBPW, businesswoman, and senator in the upper house of 
Jordan's parliament, said her father was very supportive, 
treated her equally with her brothers, and gave her more 
than her sharia-mandated share of inheritance.  Her husband 
is also very supportive and encouraged her to take over the 
family business and assist JFBPW.  Hala Ayoubi, founder and 
owner of Jordan International Tourism, was encouraged by her 
father to start her own business; he also gave her the start- 
up capital. 
 
13.  Many women referred to the family support system as a 
means for childcare.  Since daycare centers are rare in 
Jordan, mothers often depend on family members to watch 
their children while at work.  Without this presence, it is 
difficult for mothers to enter or remain in the business 
world. 
 
14.  Family support for women's business involvement also 
emerges out of a necessity for income to put bread on the 
family table.  Many women funded by MFW were forced into 
business by the loss or illness of their husbands or 
fathers, who were their households' sole earners.  For 
example, Nariman Hefawi utilized MFW loans to expand the 
construction supply and leasing operation that she took over 
after her husband became seriously ill.  Another woman, a 
refugee in the Ein al Basha camp, was forced to work as a 
secretary after her husband passed away.  Because her salary 
 
SIPDIS 
was inadequate, she applied for a loan from MFW to help 
launch a home business selling baked goods to neighbors and 
restaurants.  She was soon successfully supplying 14 food 
outlets and running a small poultry shop. 
 
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COMMENT 
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15.  Some women do succeed in business here.  Organizations 
such as WAEDAT, JFBPW, JUSBP, and MFW are available to 
assist women in their business development, financing, and 
skills training so that they can compete despite the social 
barriers that may be against them.  However, there is no 
organization that can provide family support or approval, a 
factor that plays an important role in a businesswoman's 
success.  Moreover, Jordan's legal, political, and economic 
structures, each with a seemingly institutionalized 
patriarchal system, may present barriers that are too large 
for a small group of businesswomen and organizations to 
easily overcome.  END COMMENT. 
 
HALE