المحتوى متاح باللغة الإنجليزية

On the occasion of the United Nations International Day of Rural Women, the ENI CBC Med Program organized on October 15, 2020 a webinar on the theme "Unleashing the potential of Mediterranean women in rural areas: constraints and solutions in the COVID-19 era".

The objective of this event is to analyse the situation of employment of rural women in the Mediterranean region, discuss the main constraints for rural women to reach the labour market and highlight solutions and good practices proposed by the ENI CBC Med Programme, which are likely to strengthen  the inclusion of women in economic life.

Various representatives of the Programme, funded projects, representatives of universities/research centers, NGOs... participated in this webinar which was a great success.

The InnovAgroWoMed project was represented by two organizations belonging to its consortium: The Center of Arab Woman for Training and Research CAWTAR and the University of Rome 'Tor Vergata' UTV. Indeed, Hedi Bchir, coordinator of the project at CAWTAR, Tunisia, and Nathalie Colasanti, research fellow at UTV, Italy, were among the speakers in this webinar.

Hedi Bchir presented the organization he represents 'CAWTAR' , its involvement in the promotion of gender equality, women empowerment, and participation in decision-making positions. His intervention focused on "Challenges  faced by women in rural area and the opportunity offered to them through the InnovAgroWoMed Project” thanks to the Innovative training model that will be developed following the Rural Social Innovation (RSI) paradigm.

As for Nathalie Colasanti, she emphasized in her intervention the RSI model, a crucial tool in the project, and its major role in women employment in the era of COVID-19.

The participants and organizers also appreciated the contribution of two women from the agri-food sector, Israa Hindawi, Director of the Women's Cooperative Society for Saving and Credit in Jaba', Palestine who made a great intervention on 'the social economy as a vehicle to drive women's equality in rural Palestine" and Souha Ben Mehrez, a Tunisian argonomist engineer who has done everything to realize her dream of becoming a beekeeper in her own project, against all odds. Her intervention was presented as a testimony on her personal journey full of challenges, obstacles and hope.

This webinar was also an opportunity to exchange useful contacts and leads that can help improve the situation of rural women. Indeed, Martin Heibel, head of communications for the ENI CBC Med program in turn kept the best for the end, presenting the "Opportunities of the ENI CBC Med programme to promote training, employment and business creation for women".

The InnovAgroWoMed team wishes all the best to the rural women who continue to strengthen rural development, to improve food security and to contribute to the eradication of rural poverty, despite the unfavorable conditions from which they generally suffer.