I am Sundas and I have come from a poverty-stricken underdeveloped country Pakistan. I am passionate about poverty alleviation in my country through women empowerment and children education. To enact my goals, I am enrolled in the graduate Social Enterprise Program at American University Washington DC. It is a two years masters program, which began in Fall 2014 and will continue till Summer 2016. My focus of study is international development.
Because of my own goals of being a social change agent and also to stand up to my status of being a Fulbright scholar, I volunteered my services to help prepare meals for the homeless at the DC Central Kitchen in December 2014.
DC Central Kitchen strengthens people, empowers their minds and develops communities through food. Every day, 5000 meals are prepared at the DC Central Kitchen, which is distributed to approximately 80 homeless shelters in the DC area, transitional homes, and not for profit organizations, helping them nourish their clients. Furthermore, it also offers Culinary Job Training program for unemployed women and men helping them develop skills so they are empowered to start new careers and change their lives and replace their state of homelessness, drug addiction and incarceration.
Volunteering at DC Central Kitchen was an enlightening experience. 20 volunteers assembled at the kitchen at 9 AM in the morning and were briefed on the mission of DC Central Kitchen, its impact, rules and regulations of volunteering, safety hazards and maintaining hygienic work protocols. After which, volunteers were assigned duties. I was sent to the corn cake cutting and packing station where I spent the next 3 hours cutting the cake, labeling and packing it to load it into trucks. It was an enriching experience and I have signed up with the DC Central Kitchen to continue volunteering with them in future.
During my educational tenure, I plan to develop a business model that tackles social impact and commercial revenue through a single unified strategy. Utilizing my fashion and training skills, I want to connect poor rural women in Pakistan with an easily accessible training center close to their homes that provides them with professional training and finance, they can learn to make viable products to be sold in the international market. The revenue generated can expand the business and provide personal income to them. With their own money, they can raise their household living standards, provide their children with healthy food, send them to school and create a pleasant nourishing atmosphere at their homes. The implementation of such business model can immensely contribute towards liberating Pakistani women, connecting them with financial opportunities and reducing poverty overall in the country.
My ‘big idea’ might not be innovative or new but it is certainly workable in the current setting in Pakistan and if implemented at a large scale has the potential of producing a huge impact on the economy of Pakistan and its poverty and illiteracy issues.
Sundas Liaqat 