JALALABAD // Ten-year-old Nazdana has big ambitions.
“I want to be a soldier in the Afghan army,” she declares proudly. “My army will reclaim our village and bring peace to the people of Samarkhail [her native region].”
Nazdana is a pupil at the school for the children of internally displaced people (IDP) set up by the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) outside Jalalabad city in Nangarhar province. Ironically, it is Nazdana’s status as an IDP that has enabled her to have far bigger dreams than life in her deeply conservative community in Samarkhail would have allowed.
Forced to uproot because of fighting by insurgents, Nazdana’s family have spent eight years moving from one temporary settlement to another.
Her father recently went to Iran to earn money to support the family, leaving her mother to as the decision-maker. And she decided to send three of her five daughters to the IDP school.
Nazdana and her sisters are probably the first girls in many generations of their family to get an education. The girls – 10, 12 and 13 years old – are now on a fast-track programme created by NRC for children of displaced families.
The three-year course, called Education in Emergency, aims to bring children like them up to the seventh grade and help them reintegrate into Afghanistan’s formal secondary education system.
In addition to the traditional view that educating girls is not important, those who do go to school often do not stay very long.
“While even one year of schooling can prevent or delay child marriage, and make girls literate, it usually takes more than one to three years of schooling to empower girls,” said Afghan gender activist Noorjahn Akbar. “The larger problem in Afghanistan is that while girls go to primary school, they drop out before or soon after puberty.”
Conflict in Afghanistan has driven thousands of young children out of school. Of the 250,000 Afghan refugees who were forced to return from Pakistan in the last year, an estimated 150,000 boys and girls under the age of 18 have never gone to school before.
“We are facing unprecedented levels of displaced, out-of-school children,” said William Carter, NRC’s programme director in Kabul.
The patriarchal structure of Afghan society places little value on educating girls. Between 2008 and 2012, Unicef recorded 46.4 per cent of girls attending primary school but only 21 per cent in secondary level.
Since the fall of the Taliban in 2001, about 3.5 million are still not in school and nearly 70 per cent of them are girls, said Aziz Froutan, Unicef’s communications officer.
Not every village has a separate school for girls - an important consideration for a country with strict gender segregation. And the costs of education – relatively high compared to the income of poor families – means boys will always get priority over girls in education, said Mr Froutan.
But for some girls, their IDP status has actually given them access to schooling and often for the first time.
“We see quite a few families allowing their daughters to attend school for the first time. In some families, this is the first generation of daughters getting education,” Mr Carter said.
Protection from militancy and marriage is another benefit of schools for the displaced. Young boys who are not in school are prime targets for forced recruitment into militant groups while young girls staying at home are more likely to be married off early.
Research among Iraqi and Syrian women (there is none from Afghanistan) has shown that girls who make it past fifth grade are less likely to face early marriage and death during childbirth.
Nazdana’s best friend, 10-year-old Tamanna and her family fled their village in Laghma, about 50km from Jalalabad, where fighting continues. She too is the first girl in her family to go to school and now wants to be a teacher herself.
“We don’t have much there [in the village] anyway, and I’m happier here, because I’m getting an education,” Tamanna said.
For girls like them, their displacement has ironically brought an unexpected benefit.
“There is an opportunity to build a more educated female workforce hopefully, and better gender equality in the future,” Mr Carter said.
foreign.desk@thenational.ae
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
At a glance
Global events: Much of the UK’s economic woes were blamed on “increased global uncertainty”, which can be interpreted as the economic impact of the Ukraine war and the uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Growth forecasts: Cut for 2025 from 2 per cent to 1 per cent. The OBR watchdog also estimated inflation will average 3.2 per cent this year
Welfare: Universal credit health element cut by 50 per cent and frozen for new claimants, building on cuts to the disability and incapacity bill set out earlier this month
Spending cuts: Overall day-to day-spending across government cut by £6.1bn in 2029-30
Tax evasion: Steps to crack down on tax evasion to raise “£6.5bn per year” for the public purse
Defence: New high-tech weaponry, upgrading HM Naval Base in Portsmouth
Housing: Housebuilding to reach its highest in 40 years, with planning reforms helping generate an extra £3.4bn for public finances
Traits of Chinese zodiac animals
Tiger:independent, successful, volatile
Rat:witty, creative, charming
Ox:diligent, perseverent, conservative
Rabbit:gracious, considerate, sensitive
Dragon:prosperous, brave, rash
Snake:calm, thoughtful, stubborn
Horse:faithful, energetic, carefree
Sheep:easy-going, peacemaker, curious
Monkey:family-orientated, clever, playful
Rooster:honest, confident, pompous
Dog:loyal, kind, perfectionist
Boar:loving, tolerant, indulgent
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- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
Test
Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
Real estate tokenisation project
Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.
The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.
Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.
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What is graphene?
Graphene is extracted from graphite and is made up of pure carbon.
It is 200 times more resistant than steel and five times lighter than aluminum.
It conducts electricity better than any other material at room temperature.
It is thought that graphene could boost the useful life of batteries by 10 per cent.
Graphene can also detect cancer cells in the early stages of the disease.
The material was first discovered when Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov were 'playing' with graphite at the University of Manchester in 2004.
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