The program has been organized by the Charity Society for Anti-Qat Awareness Campaign, which decided to target women as a recent study showed that the number of female users of the drug had increased in the region.

Dr. Ahlam Al-Hakami, one of the campaigners, said that the awareness program got a kick-start from Jazan Girls University. “We launched the campaign from the faculty of humanities and faculties of science. Women attending Qur’an classes at Tahfiz schools have also benefited from the campaign,” she said, adding that booklets and folders are being distributed among students and women attending classes and religious lecturers.

Al-Hakami added that there are large numbers of women using the drug. “However, this is not at all a trend among women in the region. It is possible to put an end to the abuse of qat through a systematic and effective awareness campaign,” she said, underscoring the need for more female volunteers to take part in the campaign in the predominantly rugged regions of Jazan.

According to Al-Hakami, qat is used mainly in social gatherings where women engage in chatting and idle talk for several hours. They spend the time chewing qat which acts as a stimulant and gives euphoric effects. The use and trafficking of qat is legal in Yemen but is strictly forbidden in the Kingdom, which considers it to be a narcotic. Many Yemenis are engaged in smuggling huge bundles of qat into the Kingdom, especially to the neighboring border region of Jazan.

Al-Hakami said the drug produces a negative impact on society, including on women and youngsters, prompting them to remain idle and intoxicated. It also devours their income and puts them in financial difficulties. “The habit of using qat is on the rise among women in rural areas. Similar was the case with women who live in old districts and who are mainly illiterate,” she noted.

On his part, Dr. Taher Al-Arishi, spokesman of the charity, spoke of the difficulties that campaigners face in carrying out their work. “Some men object to their women using qat. So these women use it secretively. In other cases, some old women chew it in the company of their husbands or even children. This trend is common in almost all of the major cities in the region, such as Jazan, Sabya and Abu Arish. In both cases, it is difficult for us to either collect the real statistical figures of qat addicts or reach out to them,” he said.

Al-Arishi said that those women who are taking part in the campaign are working voluntarily and not receiving any remuneration. “The society has urged the Jazan Governorate and the Ministry of Social Affairs to appoint some women to work as part of an independent ladies’ wing of the society after giving them salaries. The society has currently concentrated its activities mainly on men,” he said, while drawing attention to the findings of a recent study that nearly 70 percent of young men in the region use qat.

Al-Arishi claimed that the campaign has resulted in quitting abuse of qat by a large number of men. These people will be honored at a grand ceremony, to be opened by the governor of Jazan in the last week of 2010. He noted that the society was able to uproot as many as 45,000 qat trees from the Fifa Mountains and their neighboring areas. “The uprooting was done in cooperation with the tribal chiefs following an intensive campaign. The government has taken a series of measures to rehabilitate those affected by the destruction of qat farms in the Fifa Mountains. The authorities are giving them incentives to grow alternate farms there,” he said while regretting poor response from some growers of qat to the campaign.