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AMMAN — The Jordanian Hashemite Charity Organisation (JHCO) has dispatched a medical and humanitarian aid convoy to the Gaza Strip in coordination with the Jordan Armed Forces-Arab Army, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported on Monday.

JHCO Secretary General Ayman Mifleh said that the convoy included medical supplies and urgent humanitarian aid.

He added that the shipment is the first to leave for Gaza since the recent violence on the border, while the second batch is currently being prepared, and items are being procured from the local market based on the needs of Palestinians in Gaza and in coordination with the Royal Medical Services (RMS) and the field hospital in the Gaza Strip.

The organisation accepts donations for the support of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip as cash donations at the organisation's headquarters in Khalda and as transfers on JHCO's Islamic Bank of Jordan account No. 23099 at all its branches in the Kingdom.

AMMAN — The Ministry of Education is continuing its preparations for the General Secondary Education Certificate Examination (Tawjihi) in its 2018 summer session, which will start on June 30th, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported on Monday.

Education Ministry Spokesperson Walid Jallad said that 145,905 students from all streams applied for the exam during the period announced by the ministry, which has recently concluded.

Jallad indicated that students applying for the exam are distributed as follows: 67,688 for the literary stream, 49,929 for the scientific stream, 194 for the religious stream, 8,125 for the information technology stream, 452 for health education, 2,555 for the agricultural stream, 8,871 for the industrial stream and 1,697 for the hotel and hospitality stream, in addition to 6,394 private-study students.

AMMAN — Mayor of Umm Al Jimal District Hassan Ruhaiba said that Maronite Patriarch of Antioch, and head of the Maronite Church Moran Mor Bechara Boutros Al Rahi will head the mass at Umm Al Jimal Cathedral on June 27, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported on Monday.

The mayor said that the Patriarch will be accompanied by a huge delegation, which he said would give more importance to the ancient site, which will soon be listed in UNESCO’s World Heritage Sites.

Ruhaiba noted that the municipality has taken all necessary measures and preparations to guarantee the success of the visit, which would “greatly” contribute to promoting religious tourism in the district as well as its archaeological sites. 

AMMAN — Tkiyet Um Ali has launched its Ramadan campaign titled “Your Zakat is Mercy”, which collects donations to provide sustainable food support to some 30,000 families in need on a daily basis, the Jordan News agency, Petra, reported on Monday.

The campaign reaches out to the various governorates across the Kingdom to distribute monthly food parcels which contain 22 basic food items enough for the families’ needs for a complete month.

Tkiyet receives donations according to a fatwa by the Iftaa Department to provide aid to the underprivileged.

Tkiyet Um Ali also offers free iftar meals to more than 3,500 people on a daily basis, in addition to the distribution of meals on highways and bus stations in cooperation with the Public Security Department and the Central Traffic Department. 

AMMAN — Deputising for Prime Minister Hani Mulki, Environment Minister and acting health minister Nayef Fayez and Interior Minister Samir Mubaidin on Monday visited injured people who were transferred from Gaza to the King Hussein Medical City after the Israeli attack on the coastal enclave.

The two ministers were briefed on the health condition of the injured and stressed the government’s commitments to His Majesty King Abdullah’s directive to present the best health services to the injured Gazans, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.

Fayez and Mubaidin reiterated the Kingdom’s stance that calls for supporting Palestinians and offering medical and humanitarian aid.

NORTHERN BADIA — Lina Masaeed, a resident of Northern Badia, would like to see more girls joining training courses on variety of topics at the local youth centre in her desert town as she believes this would help her peers make an income and contribute to the development of their community.

Masaeed, who graduated a few years ago from the Hashemite University with a bachelor's degree in arts was unable to find a job with her degree and decided to join some free-of-charge courses on making handicrafts and painting offered at the Northern Badia Youth Centre. But that was not an easy task.

“My family objected at the beginning and told me it was useless and that if with a degree I was not able to find a job, so how would some courses help. But I insisted and finally convinced them,” she told The Jordan Times on Sunday.

Masaeed makes a “good” income currently from selling handicrafts and painttings. She also took training-of-trainers courses at the centre and is currently teaching at several youth centres in various areas in the Northern Badia, around 100km northeast of Amman.

“I believe I succeeded and I benefitted from the courses I took. I want families to stop being reluctant to send their daughters to such youth centres,” she said.

“I benefitted from the courses more than the university degree,” she insisted.

Masaeed was one of several young Jordanians who met with HRH Crown Prince Hussein on Sunday during a tour he took of the centre, where he was briefed on training workshops and programmes offered to the youth in Mafraq Governorate.

His visit to the Northern Badia is part of a follow-up plan on programmes targeting Jordanian youth to address their needs across the country.

HRH checked on an exhibition of handicrafts made by young Jordanians trained at the facility.

He also attended a gathering where young Jordanians were discussing His Majesty King Abdullah’s Discussion Papers and how they help enhance the youth participation of the development of local communities.

HRH also met with a group of young people who were attending an English training course and toured an exhibition where several pictures of the Northern Badia that were taken by residents of the area were on display.

The Crown Prince voiced his pride in the achievements by the centre and its support for the youth, stressing the need for developing youth-oriented programmes and addressing the local communities’ needs to enable effective participation by young people in local development.

At a meeting following the tour, the Crown Prince urged the Youth Ministry to follow up on the progress made by the young Jordanians who receive such training.

Youth Minister Bashir Rawashdeh highlighted the ministry’s programmes and activities to enhance the participation of the youth, and improve their skills in the badia and across the Kingdom.

Rawashdeh said the ministry is keen on following up on the young Jordanians who benefit from its activities and programmes, adding that the ministry works in cooperation with international institutions and the Jordanian private sector to establish pioneering youth centres.

At the meeting, Thabet Nabelsi, the ministry’s secretary general, outlined the 2018-2020 national youth strategy that entails projects in areas of entrepreneurship, education and technology, economic empowerment, health and sports, participation and citizenship, rule of law and governance, among others.

He said the activities that will be conducted as part of the strategy during the next three years will address the needs of the young Jordanians and benefit the society at large.

Aref Qataan, director of the centre, said some 200 young Jordanians have taken courses there.

“We provide training on communication skills, English speaking and writing courses, youth empowerment and leadership, handicrafts, combating societal violence and entrepreneurship,” he said on the sidelines of the Crown Prince’s visit.

Training is also provided on some vocational skills to help the youth find jobs, he said.

“The youth centre in the badia area provides a platform for the youth to make a good use of their time by learning something new and something informative and good for them,” Qataan added.

AMMAN — As Jordan has spent more than JD3 billion on its water infrastructure to cater for a spiraling water demand over the past five years, Minister of Water and Irrigation Ali Ghezawi said on Sunday that the international community’s support to its water sector was “below the needed level”.

The minister stressed that, while Jordan’s achievement in terms of collecting every available drop of water is considered “outstanding at a global level”, the gap between available water amounts and demand is still expanding.

During a meeting with the press, Ghezawi underlined that Jordan’s hosting of hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees had a toll on the Kingdom's water shares and infrastructure, expressing dismay over the international community’s “low level of response” to Jordan’s challenging water situation.

“The Syrian exodus has fatigued us. Despite all efforts to explore new water resources, the gap between supply and demand remains substantial,” Ghezawi stressed, noting that expenses in the sector amounted to 1.4 per cent of its GDP in 2017.

With over 1.3 million Syrian refugees living in the country, demand for water has increased, especially in the north, where the water per capita share has dropped by half since Syrian refugees began arriving in the country, according to the ministry.

Last year, the government launched the 2017-2019 plan, worth $658 million, which entails projects to help Jordan cope with the increasing pressure on the water sector.

“So far, we only received $52 million or 30 per cent of the needed amount… The response of donors is not up to the required level. Funding is not only about infrastructure projects; after all, how can you sustain operating such projects,” Ghezawi told reporters.

The minister highlighted that the Treasury is burdened with the cost of providing water and wastewater services in light of the Kingdom’s water shortage, highlighting that every cubic metre of water that reaches consumers costs JD2.35, JD1.08 of which is paid by the government in the form of subsidy.

Against this backdrop, the government “has no plan to raise the water tariff this year or anytime soon”, Ghezawi affirmed, underlining that, in 2017, the government supported the water sector with JD246 million, constituting 21.4 per cent of its deficit that year.

“Water projects worth JD4.76 billion will have been implemented by 2023; this explains the increasing indebtedness of the water sector, which stands at JD2.01 billion and makes up 7.4 per cent of the government’s JD27.2 billion debt,” Ghezawi noted.

Over the past 10 years, the ministry has implemented 144 projects worth JD3.145 billion, in addition to 12 projects worth JD145 million to reduce the running costs of the water resources, the minister said, noting that it has managed to save JD12 million after implementing projects to reduce the expenditure of water resources.

‘Self-reliance’

Meanwhile, the ministry is embarking on a set of strategic mega projects to be implemented between 2018 and 2025 to address water scarcity by generating an additional amount of 362 million cubic metres of water, according to the minister.

Such projects entail the Red Sea-Dead Sea Water Conveyance Project, the Amman-Shidiyeh-Hassa Water Conveyance Project, Red Sea desalination water, Wadi Al Arab Water Project, Waleh/Heidan Project, Tannour Dam Project, Hisban River Project, Mujib Dam Water Conveyance Project, as well as several water treatment plants and new dams.

“All these projects cost JD3.5 billion,” Ghezawi said, stressing that the desalination of seawater and brackish water, which is abundant in several parts of the country, is Jordan’s way forward to attaining its water security.

“We seek self-reliance,” Ghezawi underlined.

AMMAN — People who want to innovate do not necessarily know where to start and often need a bit of guidance to be able to unleash their entrepreneurial potential, said Neda’ Kharoub, co-founder of Trip to Innovation (TTI), a non-governmental organisation aimed at supporting innovation and entrepreneurship among youth and women around Jordan.

Set up in 2010 in Irbid, TTI recently launched “SheInnovate2”, the second edition of its female incubator programme that targets women entrepreneurs in Irbid and Karak governorates with the support of USAID Jordan Local Enterprise Support Project.

“‘SheInnovate2’ follows the first edition of our project ‘SheInnovate1’, which was conducted last year in Irbid and reached 300 women, providing them with entrepreneurship awareness and training services,” TTI Director Belal Raslan told The Jordan Times, noting that ten of these women were enrolled in the final incubator.

Following the success of its 2017 project and the creation of a new incubator in Karak, the organisation started expanding its scope to the southern governorate, by supporting over 25 aspiring female entrepreneurs, nine of whom were “incubated”. 

“We seek to create a platform to support the innovation and social entrepreneurship culture among Jordanian women and youth by providing these groups with some basic skills to enhance their natural abilities and help them turn their ideas into viable and sustainable projects,” Kharoub said, noting that the incubation phase helps beneficiaries map their business ideas into a workable business model through various training on technical topics such as idea validation, business model and planning, fundraising and marketing.

“Many women have great capacities and amazing ideas; they just need a little push to put them into action,” the co-founder continued, noting that the training programmes focus on business, legal and financial support services such as business registration and ICT inclusion to help incubatees acquire the skills they need to organise their thoughts and create a coherent project.

After various phases of filtration, a selected number of businesses are accepted into a six-month incubation phase, resulting in the women-owned businesses’ registration with ICT-enabled services such as e-shops and e-services.

Aware of the various backgrounds the aspiring entrepreneurs are coming from, TTI also focuses on providing gradual and adapted programmes which are catered to the needs of all women who apply.

“To start off, it seemed essential to focus on the knowledge aspect of entrepreneurship because, although some of our participants are already well on track, some unemployed women lost touch with the latest practices in the labour market,” said Raslan, noting that the beneficiaries are progressively acquainted with the world of entrepreneurship through technical topics required to develop business ideas.

“Once they set up their businesses, we do not release female entrepreneurs into the market without support though; TTI keeps supporting them through mentorship and regular advisory services from our team of experts,” Raslan explained, citing the trainees’ introduction to local and international role models who share their personal success stories and provide businesswomen with guidance and advice on creating a strong and sustainable network with the business community.

In July 2017, TTI decided to physically record that network by creating the first “entrepreneurship ecosystem map” of Jordan that lists 150 entities divided into eight main categories: finance, support organisations, advisory services, education, corporation, media, government and donors. 

“We created the map with the aim of calling for a national agenda for entrepreneurship, supported with reliable statistics and references. The map seeks to serve as a reference for the key stakeholders and decision makers to identify opportunities and gaps in the entrepreneurial ecosystem,” Raslan pointed out.

Since its foundation, TTI has won regional recognitions including a royal recognition as a local success story in 2015, the 2017 CSR Arabia Social Entreprise Award and the BADIR Fellowship.

AMMAN — “After climbing Mount Everest, I feel that I had the power to do anything new for myself and for this world,” recalled Jarrah Al Hawamdeh, a 22-year-old amputee who recently made history by climbing to Mount Everest base camp in spite of his disability.

The young Jordanian, who lost his right leg to bone cancer at 15 years old, has now set his sights on climbing Mount Elbrus, the tallest mountain in Europe located in Russia.

Al Hawamdeh said his outstanding performance pushed him to go even further and “show people that nothing is impossible”.

He has been using his mountaineering skills to help raise money to save his former UNRWA school, which is in danger of closing due to recent drastic funding cuts to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees.

Located in east Amman, Al Jofeh Boys School is one of the 174 UNRWA schools in Jordan which provide basic education to over 118,500 students, according to the UNWRA website. 

Al Hawamdeh, who is currently training for his next big challenge, recently became a “Friend of Palestine Refugees” with UNRWA, through which he helps raise awareness about the importance of education for Palestinian refugees.

“I feel like I am paying back my school, like I am responsible for these kids and their future,” the young man told The Jordan Times, stressing “they should have the same opportunity I had in this school to establish my future.”

Al Hawamdeh has been running a fundraising campaign under the slogan “#MyFirstStep”, which seeks to raise money for his former school which “helped him take his first step”. 

“My first step to keep my school open began on April 3 and, 17,500 steps later on April 14, I finally reached Mt Everest Base Camp [5,364m],” he said following his last month achievement, calling on people to donate at https://getinvolved.unrwausa.org/myfirststep 

In between training, he also created solidarity UNRWA stickers, which are sold at local events to raise money for the campaign, recently attracting the attention of local schools and institutions.

One of them is the Canadian International School, whose staff and students helped raise JD500 and visited the Al-Jofeh school. 

“After telling the students about my journey to Everest, one student asked me ‘Are you going to do anything really hard next, like fight a tiger?’,” Al Hawamdeh recalled with a smile.

“Jarrah is so popular now! He has become a real model for people to turn tough challenges into great opportunities and to show people that nothing is impossible,” a friend of Al Hawamdeh told The Jordan Times.

The young man said he was inspired for his latest challenge after watching a lot of videos on climbing Mount Elbrus, which is the tenth highest peak in the world. 

It will take Al Hawamdeh a year of training before he is ready to climb the snow-capped peak, which stands at a height of 5,642 metres, according to web sources. 

“I thought it would be an amazing journey if I did it, also because I have never been in Europe or in Russia before to climb,” he concluded.

AMMAN — Twenty male and female students from Husban district on Sunday received scholarships offered by the Jordanian Hashemite Fund for Human Development’s (JOHUD) Goodwill Campaign, according to a JOHUD statement. 

The campaign’s educational programme helps students of underprivileged families across the Kingdom pursue higher education in order to be “equipped with science and knowledge to build their future”, according to the statement.

Goodwill also provided support to several women in the district to help them establish their own “home-based business start-ups”, as part of the campaign’s efforts to help women establish income-generating projects that would enhance their families’ living conditions.

During her meeting with Husban’s Zakat committee and women committees, HRH Princess Basma, president of the Goodwill Campaign higher committee, stressed on the keenness of the campaign and its partners to instil the values of social solidarity among society members through various activities. 

She noted that “all individuals and institutions are partners in providing such noble and charitable work”. 

Princess Basma highlighted the importance of initiatives that empower Jordanian women to face economic challenges and enhance their families’ living conditions, praising the efforts of the women committee in Husban and their fruitful initiatives in this regard.

The campaign distributed 300 food parcels to underprivileged families in cooperation with the Zakat committee, as well as gifts and clothes to 75 children at the kindergarten of Princess Basma Centre for Development in Husban.

Director of the Princess Basma Centre for Development in Husban Neima Ghazzawi outlined the centre’s various activities and initiatives organised by the centre’s youth and women committees with the aim of serving the development process in the district.

For his part, President of the Zakat committee Hussein Awawdeh displayed the objectives and achievements of the committee since its launch in 2006, including the collection and distribution of donations to the needy.

Princess Basma expressed the campaign’s keenness on further cooperation with the committee to provide more support to the underprivileged families in the district.