Loading ...Three Syrian Entrepreneurs Share The Positive Impacts of Conflict & Crisis
Sana Hawasly organizes Wikilogia hackathons to economically empower Syrian students by helping them build up their competencies for producing engineering solutions to real-world problems.SOURCE: FORBES
BY: MELISSA JUN ROWLEY
Becoming a successful entrepreneur in any country is a tall task. For people building companies in the Western World, getting access to capital and resources is no small feat. For entrepreneurs in conflict zones like Syria, creating startups is a means of survival and boosting economic recovery for the country. And if the world would look beyond mainstream news headlines, entrepreneurship could be the means for peace.
The ongoing Syrian Civil War started in 2011, killing an estimated 400,000 Syrians, according to the UN Envoy for Syria. Despite the toughest odds, more than 150 startups launched in Syria in 2017, according to the World Economic Forum.
For 24-year-old Syrian entrepreneur Salam Al-Nukta, the crisis has become a part of everyday life. Not only has she gotten used to the conflict, she’s learned to channel the hardships to make a positive impact on her community and for Syrian youth, which constitute the largest percentage of citizens in the country.
“When you’re facing such a situation, you’re able to do things you never thought you’d be able to do,” says Al-Nukta.
An intrepid advocate for entrepreneurship and technology, Al-Nukta is the cofounder of ChangeMakers, a youth-led initiative designed to close the gender gap in technology. Featuring TED-ed curriculum, the program aims to prepare youth to be competitive with their peers around the world. Self-perception and how to plan for the future are as much a part of the inititiative as learning how to code.
Salam Al-Nukta started the ChangeMakers program to help Syrian youth learn how to code and find their passion.
Over the years, Al-Nukta has noticed positive shifts in the young people she works with in Syria. Three trainees of the ChangeMakers program were awarded the UWC scholarship, a high honor for young people aiming to pursue their education and an international baccalaureate, a two-year program that provides acceptance for entry into higher education institutions around the world.
“We’ve also noticed the changes in young people’s personalities, character, aspirations, and how they perceive life,” shares Al-Nukta. “ChangeMakers wasn’t only giving young people coding skills. It was ultimately changing their lives.”
Al-Nukta adds that since the war started there has been an increase in the number of people going into coding. Additionally, she’s seen a rise in social activities focused on community and innovation, such as TEDx and Startup Weekend, taking place across Syria.
“The world wants to focus on the destruction rather than the evolution of our young people,”says Al-Nukta. “Three ChangeMakers alumni, some of the most talented minds in Syria, were awarded the UWC scholarship, and there are many more. But we lack our right to be visible and to be heard. This is a very important right that the world has taken away from us because it wants to focus on the dark side. I’m not saying we should ignore that the crisis is happening, but we don’t want to miss out on opportunities for the living people.”
As it stands, unyielding circumstances in Syria already have a number of Syrian youth caught between a rock and a war. According to the report Entrepreneurship in Conflict Zones by Ahmad Sufian Bayram, Techstars regional manager, MEA, sanctions imposed by the US, the European Union, the Arab League and the United Nations, prevent startups from using certain technologies. At the same time, internal sanctions restrict the transfer of some goods and services. All e-payment systems have been banned in the country, prompting entrepreneurs to seek to open bank accounts or get business licenses in neighbouring countries, which is easier said than done.
“Young people face suppression, and can’t get their ideas across borders,” says Al-Nukta. “If you have a Syrian young person with an idea, but then you see a counterpart in, let’s say, Lebanon, the person in Lebanon has more opportunities. The odds are more in their favor.”
A Good Test Bed
All that being said, 25-year-old Syrian entrepreneur Sana Hawasly, a close friend of Al-Nukta’s, says there are advantages to launching a startup in Syria.
The day I Skype interviewed her, she had just arrived in Aleppo. Once the largest city in Syria, Aleppo has been one of the main battlegrounds of the war. But that doesn’t stop Hawasly from traveling near and far to prepare Syrian youth for the technology labor market.
In addition to being one of the main organizers ofWikilogia, a collaborative community of computer engineering students in Damascus, Hawasly is the cofounder of Daraty, which creates educational toolkits that teach kids the basics of electronics and problem-solving. Last year, Daraty was nominated by the World Economic Forum as one of the top Arabic startups shaping the fourth industrial revolution.
“Yes, we have explosions,” says Hawasly. “Yes, we’re hit with rockets. But I think Syrians have developed a resilience in every aspect because of this. There might be an explosion in Damascus, the capital of Syria, where I live, but we still have to work on our projects and initiatives. If you stop, you’ll be left behind. So maybe that’s the thing that’s led us to where we are now, and why we’ve never stopped.”
While Hawasly says that while Syrian entrepreneurs face disadvantages, due to the crisis, the country has good developers, cheap labor, access to tools and infrastructure.
“About 10 years ago, Syria was able to manufacture everything it needed without having to import anything,” says Hawasly. Nowadays, factories have closed. A lot of intellectuals have left, and we’ve lost a lot of resources. But there are still some resources we can benefit from. For example, it’s much easier and cheaper for us to open up a production line, to test products, and create batches for piloting before going to China or the Gulf. We have restrictions because we don’t have e-payment systems, but at the same time we’re making up our mind to do these things with alternatives.”
Working with alternatives and making the most of available resources is something widely practiced at the ICT Incubator, an initiative created by the Syrian Computer Society. There are three incubators in the country—one in Damascus, one in Homs, and one in Lattakia. Each program provides office space and equipment for free.
Computer engineer, Fadwa Murad, supervises the incubator in Damascus and does project management to help its eight startups grow. With 14 women and 13 men in the group, it’s refreshing to see gender balance. And irrespective of gender, all of the entrepreneurs are aiming to create businesses to help their country.
“Many youth feel depressed, so we encourage them to get into entrepreneurship by providing the basics on how to create an idea that will serve their community,” says Murad. “The war has pushed entrepreneurship in youth forward because they’ve started to establish their own businesses to survive. “We have an explosion every other day. We hide for some minutes, and then we go back to work because we have to survive.”
Fadwa Murad supervises startups at the ICT Incubator in Damascus, Syria.
Amid the push for survival, Murad sees a brighter outlook.
“To be honest, in 2012 it was harder,” she shares. “We could not imagine how to survive in such a war. So many people stayed home. But now after seven years you can no longer stay home. You have to work, to continue. I’m happy that most of the youth who have activities in cities like Damascus are now able to do more than survive.”
If the US and other nations truly want the Syrian war to end, sanctions need to be lifted and policies need to be made fair and just. Of course, the only way this might one day possible is through international outreach, communication and collaboration. With all the digital technology and connectivity the Western world has at its fingertips, this is possible. Yes, peace is possible!
