Evaluation session for the project «Encouraging Gaza's young entrepreneurs to build an entrepreneurial society»

Pal-Think for Strategic Studies held an evaluation session within the project “Encouraging young entrepreneurs in Gaza to create an entrepreneurial society”, implemented by Pal-Think for Strategic Studies and funded by the Middle East Partnership Initiative. The encounter was attended by a group of young men and women, the entrepreneurs participating in the project who possess ideas for small projects — the participants having received an integrated training course titled “How to start your own project”, which took up several topics concerning management, production, marketing, and finance, under the supervision of a team of trainers and mentors from the private sector competent in the aforementioned topics; the training continued theoretically and practically from January 2016 until July 2016.

The encounter was opened by Mr Omar Shaban, director of Pal-Think for Strategic Studies, who welcomed the attendees, thanking them for their commitment throughout the project's period, and praised their constant keenness to hone their talents and develop their skills in the various fields. The encounter aimed to follow up and evaluate the work and take stock of what had been reached in the project — of training and mentoring for the participants and development of their business plans by the mentors' team, to bring them to sustainable economic projects that contribute to improving their living conditions; also to discuss the obstacles that faced the participants during their field training, in addition to their recommendations and proposals, and to take them into consideration in other projects.

The youth began presenting what they had achieved of accomplishments and activities, and their opinions gathered on the high usefulness of the training within the project: they all affirmed that they had possessed mere ideas for projects in their imagination, and now they have the idea integrated, with a working plan ready for implementation, supervised by specialists each in their field. The youth likewise affirmed the increase of their knowledge of new ideas and of the market's laws and the promotion of goods and services — which will have a great effect on carrying out the necessary development of their future projects' plans. All the participants likewise agreed on their readiness to begin carrying out their projects after the increase of their motivation to work — especially as, after the long training within the project “Encouraging young entrepreneurs in Gaza to create an entrepreneurial society”, they were able to reach the lowest costs and the lowest loss rate in their plans, which encouraged them to work strongly to realise their entrepreneurial ideas. Among these youth are those who have actually begun implementation: one participant, Marwan Atallah, 22 years old, from the Maghazi camp, reported: “I actually began implementing and selling my wooden products, and I was able to promote 100 pieces in the Eid al-Fitr period after I learned the process of marketing and management at the lowest costs within this project”

The mentors' team likewise affirmed that they too benefited from this project in consolidating the networking process between their institutions and themselves as a mentors' team — who worked with integrated effort to create empowered, productive youth able to find work opportunities for themselves by themselves, indeed contributing to reducing the unemployment rate in their society as well.