CAIRO: By 2020, Alashanek Ya Balady Association for Sustainable Development aims to graduate 10 million underprivileged Egyptians above of the poverty line. In a press conference Tuesday, the NGO launched a campaign named “Foq El-Khat” or “Above the Line,” whose strategy is to provide loans for establishing individual, group and medium sized enterprises in various fields, and providing educational and agricultural individual funds for employment to equip individuals with the necessary skills to either work in the private sector or starts their own business. Raghda El-Ebrashi, founder and chairperson of Alashanek Ya Balady, and Mohamed El-Kamel, the NGO's programs director and strategist, outlined the campaign, pointing out the problems it aims aiming to solve, which are unemployment and poverty. The association plans to eradicate poverty through integrating loans, employment and training, as well as education and awareness. According to the World Bank, 44 percent of Egypt's population lived under the poverty line, 25 percent of the workforce were unemployed, based on 2010 statistics. The number did not decrease much after the Jan. 25 uprising as 20 percent of the workforce is still unemployed, leaving about “20 million spending on 80 million,” El-Ebrashi mentioned. “Our aim is to increase our employment opportunities in order to extract 10 million out of the 35 million under the poverty line,” she said. “In Alashanek Ya Balady, we believe in the power of the civic sector to create innovative opportunities for the underprivileged to sustain their lives, and activate the effective engagement of youth in solving society's problems. The dream of changing a countries' entire corrupt regime which lasted over 30 years by Egyptian youth in only 18 days has been realized by the same youth who now dream to empower their underprivileged compatriots to rise above the poverty line,” El Ebrashi said. El-Kamel explained that the organization needs the support of the media to spread the word as well as the support of corporates, the civil society, the government and the private sectors because without them “we cannot employ.” “We never work alone. To gain momentum we work with other NGOs and by doing so it will be easier to eradicate poverty,” he said. Alashanek Ya Balady is an innovative NGO which aims to create an economically independent society and promotes youth engagement in sustainable development through creating innovative regional models. The NGO was the first Egyptian organization recognized as a YouthActionNet Global Fellow in 2008. In 2010, it was also awarded the Young Global Leaders from the World Economic Forum and Schwab Foundation from Switzerland. Alashanek Ya Balady was first established in 2002 as a student club at the American University in Cairo (AUC) to promote the concept of volunteerism among Egyptian youth and to introduce them to development as a wider domain and a demonstration of collective social efforts combating poverty and complementing traditional charity. It later spread throughout other universities such as the German University in Cairo (GUC) and Ain Shams University.
