The ILO and the Public Works Project (PWP) in Yemen have launched training workshops for Yemeni women seeking to be community contractors, to start their own businesses, or to find employment within Employment Intensive Programmes implemented in the country.

The first training workshop has launched in the capital Sanaa, with another set to follow in Aden.

A total of 56 women from 10 governorates across Yemen will be trained by the end of the two workshops on gender-responsive community contracting, a procurement tool empowering communities by ensuring they have an executive role in the identification, planning and implementation of development initiatives.

The workshops also include training on the basics of the EIIP approach, decent work principles, and on the basic principles of emergency employment, environmental and social safeguards (ESS) and occupational safety and health (OSH).

Trainees who demonstrate interest and commitment will be provided, in accordance with an established selection criteria, with seed funding for establishing their own businesses. Those who start their own businesses will then be given the chance to bid for implementing pilot EIIP projects.

At the opening of the Sanaa training workshop, PWP Manager Said Abdo said: “PWP aims through this partnership with the ILO to engage women in the construction sector and to open new opportunities for women through the community contracting mechanism.”

ILO National Programme Coordinator in Yemen Ali Dehaq said: “The ILO is working with PWP and other national partners to promote decent work values through providing technical assistance and expertise to review the existing mechanisms for cash-for-work initiatives, and to ensure the created jobs are rights-based and provide decent working conditions.”

The training is part of a joint ILO-PWP project within the framework of the Employment Intensive Investment Programme (EIIP) and decent employment for women in Yemen. The project has also produced an emergency employment manual, updated the PWP’s existing community contracting manual to be more gender-responsive, updated and enhanced the PWP's existing ESS and OSH manual and framework to better align with ILO guidelines, supported development of PWP’s emergency employment Information Management System (IMS), and updated PWP's operational manual.