Our Stories

Our company in Kabul

In March 2024, we founded in Afghanistan a company. It’s named Omid-e-shafaq. It’s domiciliated in Kabul, and the company is duly registered at commercial court. Our office is in the capital’s center. This structure was vital to develop our projects in total transparency with the current regime. We have a cooridnator in Kabul.
Sylvie Cozzolino is t Omid-e-shafaq’s funder and chairwoman. The company works exclusively with Afghanistan today and Tomorrow
Nothing changes in our organization. Projects are decided and developped from France. As the funds that are managed by the association at Lyon.

Oswa's Workshop

Oswa is 26 years old. She lives in a province in northern Afghanistan and has a degree in sewing. Oswa has always sewn clothes for his family, relatives and neighbours without receiving a salary. The young woman designs and makes dresses, shirts and trousers. These are her creations. More… “should lead to the details of the story by clicking on more” Oswa works on a manual sewing machine on the floor of the entrance to the house she shares with her husband, brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law, and her husband's parents. Oswa informally trains young women in her village to sew. Since the Taliban came to power in August 2021, women have not been allowed to work outside the home. Oswa is a young woman who dreams of making a living from her profession. She will make scarves, dresses and embroidered tunics that we will sell in France. However, this clothing line will also have an Afghan version so that the women of her village and province can also take ownership of these items designed and produced locally, to make them proud. Afghanistan Today and Tomorrow shares this adventure.

Our Project

One collection, one brand:
Oswa is currently sewing the first scarves to be sold in France in December 2023. She works with another seamstress and embroiderer who live in a village not far from her home in northern Afghanistan. The women work entirely manually. Together, they will make the first collection of clothing made in Afghanistan that AAD will sell in spring 2024. We support these women to create the clothes of their dreams under a brand that has a strong identity and makes them proud. The goal is to create, in the first year, a collection of a hundred pieces and small accessories (clothes, pencil cases, canvas bags, scarves). To make this dream possible and professionally harmonize a small group of women, we want to equip these women with electric sewing machines and a suitable place to be able to work in group, away from their homes where they can find a space for socialization, of which they have been deprived since the Taliban came to power in August 2021.

Training

Each project supported by AAD has a training component. We are currently training Oswa to take responsibility and organize a production line. Oswa is now also in charge of setting up a suitable room for the seamstresses in her village.We hope that Oswa, who graduated in sewing from the Lincoln Institute in Panjshir (a training centre that is now closed), will be able to train young seamstresses. It already does so informally. AAD's ambition on this project is to open a Sewing Academy within 3 years.