The Charity Bank joins in the Eid festivities with clothes made by Iraqi Families.

As part of The Charity Bank for Small Businesses, the Al-Baiyaa Cultural Forum, in association with the Uyoon Al-Rahma Al-Ilahiyya organisation, hosted a celebration to distribute Eid gifts to orphans from the Al-Baiyaa district and surrounding areas. The celebration took place on Wednesday evening, 8^th September 2010, in the organisation’s headquarters in Al-Baiyaa district.

The celebration saw 360 orphans - 166 boys and 194 girls – each receive an item of clothing. The orphans represented 90 of the families registered with the Uyoon Al-Rahma organisation. The first family received four pieces of clothing as well as shoes purchased by the organisation, along with boys’ trousers donated by a shop-owner from Al-Baiyaa. On top of this, 800 copies of the children’s educational magazine, “Ahmad”, were given out. They were donated by the Al-Taawun Charity, a subsidiary of the Iraqi Charities Forum set up to encourage reading and the love of learning among children. Some of the children present had never seen a magazine in their own home before.

The celebration opened with a reading from the Qur’an, after which a representative for the Iraqi Charities Forum, which oversees the Charity Bank, gave a short speech about the project, how it works, and what it hopes to achieve socially and economically. After this, clothes were given out to the list of chosen families, who had been invited to attend the event two days before.

The clothes on display came from families, who stressed that they were of a high quality, on a par with Western imported goods, and suitable for children on special occasions such as these. They were of higher quality than the South East Asian merchandise that has flooded the Iraqi market due to its cheap prices, and just as well-made in terms of the fabric and accessories used. The clothes were laid out in such a way as to encourage women to buy clothes in their children’s size, favourite colour and brand.

The project has thus achieved part of its mission which is to buy tailored products from Iraqi women, in order to encourage them to keep working and guarantee them a permanent source of income. As well as this, it aims to develop their potential (especially the beginners) to the point where they can produce 20 items of clothing in a short space of time. Some of the women have already reached this speed, which shows the high level of skill they have developed. The project has also given the women the chance to gain a reputation and has made it easy for them to establish a customer base in their neighbourhood, since their work was put on display for four days in the Al-Graiaat region where most of the women live.

The combined value of clothes bought from the women totalled 1,544,500 Iraqi Dinars. The clothes had been donated by members of the Al-Baiyaa Cultural Forum, whose Public Relations Committee in Iraq is run by a representative for the Iraqi Charities Forum

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