THE Khadija bint Khuwailid Center at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI) continues to pave the way for Saudi businesswomen to empower them economically and socially so that they become a vital part of national development. When women joined the JCCI Management Board after elections and became part of the decision-making process, they realized that the center has more to offer women than just training.
“No matter how much you train women, there are still difficulties for them outside that seem to continue on the same track. We don’t want to compete with the private sector that is also training people,” said Basma Al-Omair, director of the Khadija bint Khuwailid Center. “The presence of women as members in the JCCI Management Board has helped facilitate the work of the Khadija bint Khuwailid Center a great deal.”
To remove the obstacles businesswomen face and to empower them, the center has opened three main departments: Government Files Department, Development Programs Department and Customer Service Department.
“In the Government Files Department we open three government files for three different ministries each year. Last year we opened files for the Ministry of Labor, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry and the Technical and Vocational Training Corporation (TVTC) ... and we keep on lobbying. It takes time to identify the obstacles and to find the solutions,” said Al-Omair.
The three departments try to cover a wide range of services that help in facilitating the path for women seeking a startup or just facilitate their efforts to expand or just overcome obstacles in their businesses.
“The Customer Service Department is where all the problems related to women’s issues come in, issues they face when dealing with government offices that need to be resolved. These problems are facilitated with other departments in the JCCI, or we send them to different ministries. Sometimes women come to the center, but we really can’t help them,” said Al-Omair. “(But) the presence of women as members in the JCCI Management Board helped facilitate the work of the Khadija bint Khuwailid Center a great deal.”
Last month, more than 600 women attended a meeting at the JCCI about their rights. Planning and organizing similar events is one of many other tasks of the Development Programs Department.
“It’s where the awareness and development programs come in. The department also is concerned with research. We’re doing research with the World Bank, the Jeddah Municipality, the Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority (SAGIA) and many others. We conduct high quality research that supports our arguments when it comes to government files,” explained Al-Omair.
In cooperation with IPSOS, a research company in the Middle East, the center did a survey of 697 Saudi citizens in Jeddah regarding women’s contributions to national development. The results showed that 78 percent of women are unemployed compared to 21 percent of unemployed men. The survey also revealed that 45 percent believes that there are no hurdles that hinder the participation of women in the job market. After meeting Mohammad Al-Harbi, the Commerce and Trade Ministry’s director of the Makkah province, the center is working in cooperation with the ministry to develop a unified commercial record for men and women, expand and develop the women’s section in the ministry to offer better services, allow women to run and manage their own businesses without having to hire a male manager, allow women to participate in all activities including public services, real estate and construction, and allow the registration of women as managers, including members of management boards in family companies.
“We’ve had a couple of successes. One of them has been identifying the article in the Labor Law that stated no mixing between genders in the workplace. It has been changed to state that men and women need to work in accordance to Shariah (but otherwise can work together). This change was intimated to us through a letter from the labor minister. It’s much broader now,” said Al-Omair.
Despite the progress and successes, Al-Omair said that women do tend to get frustrated at the slow pace of things. For her, just learning the system and how it works is rewarding at times and challenging at others.
“Women lack awareness and people in general lack sources of information. Public libraries are not available. No methodology of finding this law or that ... it takes a lot of energy to find regulations and when they are found it’s very difficult to make them public,” said Al-Omair.
In compliance with the Khadija bint Khuwailid Center’s vision to support businesswomen, Al-Omair said that they have to pave an easier, better road for the upcoming generation. “They have higher expectations. They are more connected to the world. You can’t expect them to go back to old laws. I worry about them. I don’t want them to find obstacles. They are very motivated and ambitious and I want it to keep it that way,” she said. Al-Omair said that all women are welcome at the center and that they do not just cater to the “rich and famous.”
“When we held a lecture about women’s rights, we marketed it to everyone. We asked charity organizations to bus their families to learn about women’s rights. In fact, all the laws and regulations we are working on don’t cater to just the rich and famous or the middle class or the people of Jeddah,” said Al-Omair.
Khadijah bint Khuwailid, Prophet Mohammad’s wife (peace be upon him), after whom the center was named, succeeded in managing her father’s business interests and preserving the family’s vast wealth more than 1,500 years ago despite the reality of the extremely paternalistic society at the time.
The center, adopting a mission to support businesswomen, aims to activate work and dialogue to enable women to participate in the economic growth and development of the country.
On a personal note, Al-Omair said the work at the center has been rewarding. “I’ve worked in the center for the past two and a half years,” she said. “It’s been a learning experience. I could’ve never imagined that there were laws and regulations that were so old, that has not been reformed, not in sync with today’s world that is globalizing. I believe women should work and get involved in the economy, and the center is there to give them a helping hand.”
