Women’s Voices Series: Meet Wafa’a

News

Prosperity Candle Yobo Member
April 15th, 2011

Credit: WikiMedia

After an incredible first year, we thought we’d spend some time this spring celebrating the women we work with. Their stories are rich & inspiring. We hope you’ll share them! This email is the first of a series of five. Each one will profile a different woman.

Meet Wafa’a

” I make candles of hope.”

Wafa’a lives in Baghdad, Iraq and is widowed with four sons. Her husband was killed by a mortar which dropped onto his grocery store and also hurt her son. She is a strong woman and very optimistic – with a lot of dreams. One day she hopes to create a small candle-making factory. She will employ all of her friends in the community. She hopes that her candles will reach the entire world – even President Obama so that he will know that it is Iraqi women who are sending him Prosperity Candles (watch her video here).

If Wafa’a earns more income, her sons can complete their studies and become good people in society. Her oldest son needs surgery and hopes to get it done abroad – he still has shrapnel in his body because of the bombs. She hopes to buy a home of her own and a car to drive her sons safely to school.

With the help of Prosperity Candle, Wafa’a hopes to put an end to these dark days in her life so they will be bright and shining.

4,000 Candles Campaign – Can You Help Us?

In 2009 Prosperity Candle launched its first project with Women for Women International, training Iraqi women to start highly scalable candle businesses. The goal was to demonstrate the potential to earn well above a living wage through sales to both local and international markets. Many of these women are now exporting to the U.S. via Prosperity Candle, and others are earning twice the minimum wage in Baghdad through local sales alone. It’s an exciting, scalable, replicable model for enterprise development.

Here is our challenge.

We are launching our 4,000 Candles Campaign for Mother’s Day (May 8th) in order to attract funding and expand our work into other countries. Every 10 candles = a living wage for a day. 4,000 candles sold = 400 days of living wage income for women entrepreneurs. So we are reaching out to communities where our mission resonates, and where there is particular interest in supporting bold initiatives for empowering women through enterprise.

Can you help?

Click here to buy a candle and support Wafa’a’s dreams today!

10 candles = 1 day’s living wage for a woman like Wafa’a

Story originally appeared at Prosperity Candle