From Home to Homepage: Afghan Women in Business

Global Women’s Trade Caravan (GWTC) continues to expand From Home to Homepage, helping Afghan women entrepreneurs build the digital skills, online presence, and market connections they need to sustain their businesses in an increasingly restrictive environment.

Restrictions on women’s mobility, access to physical markets, and participation in public and economic life continue to create significant barriers for women entrepreneurs across Afghanistan. Against this backdrop, digital skills and e-commerce are not simply additional business tools—they provide an increasingly important pathway for women to remain economically active, reach customers, and stay connected to opportunities.

45 More Women Equipped with E-Commerce Skills

During this reporting period, GWTC trained an additional 45 women entrepreneurs in e-commerce and digital business skills.

Training focused on practical skills women can immediately apply to their businesses, including digital marketing, social media, product photography and presentation, writing effective product descriptions, and using online platforms to reach customers.

Beyond group training, our team continues to provide hands-on and individualized support to women as they develop their digital presence and strengthen their businesses.

The number of women-owned shops on MadeByAfghanWomen.com has now grown to 135.

Each new shop represents much more than a number. Behind every storefront is a woman entrepreneur working to sustain a business, generate income, support her family, employ others, and remain economically active despite extraordinary constraints.

GWTC’s support does not end when a shop is created. Women continue to receive coaching to improve their product presentation, marketing, customer engagement, and ability to use digital tools effectively.

From Digital Presence to Market Access

As the marketplace grows, our focus is increasingly on helping women move from simply being online to doing business online.

Women entrepreneurs are receiving greater visibility for their products, connecting with customers beyond their immediate communities, and pursuing domestic and international sales opportunities. These experiences reinforce an important lesson from our work: digital access is most effective when it is combined with sustained coaching, market connections, mentorship, and practical business support.

Highlights in Numbers

• 45 additional women trained in e-commerce and digital business skills

• 135 women-owned shops now established on MadeByAfghanWomen.com

• Continued one-on-one coaching and technical support

• Continued promotion of Afghan women-owned businesses and products

• Growing connections between women entrepreneurs, buyers, mentors, and the Afghan diaspora

Building on Evidence

This work continues to be informed by GWTC’s nationwide assessment of women entrepreneurs across Afghanistan and the resulting Roadmap for Action. The findings reinforced the need for greater digital literacy, market access, business networks, financial resources, and sustained support for women entrepreneurs.

Through From Home to Homepage, GWTC is putting those findings into practice—one woman and one business at a time.

Expanding Connections Through the Afghan Women’s Global Business Hub

During this reporting period, GWTC also continued to introduce the Afghan Women’s Global Business Hub (AfWomenGlobHub.com) to women entrepreneurs in Afghanistan. This is digital space designed to connect Afghan women entrepreneurs with one another and with business knowledge, experts, mentors, buyers, and opportunities beyond their immediate communities.

While MadeByAfghanWomen.com focuses on bringing women’s products and businesses to market, the Business Hub strengthens the connections, knowledge, and networks around those businesses. This is particularly important in an environment where women have increasingly limited access to physical business associations, networking spaces, training opportunities, and professional gatherings.

Through the Hub, GWTC has begun organizing sector-based networking and learning sessions, connecting women from different provinces and creating opportunities for entrepreneurs to exchange experiences, learn from experts, and build relationships with other women in their industries.

Together, MadeByAfghanWomen.com and the Afghan Women’s Global Business Hub form two interconnected parts of GWTC’s growing digital ecosystem: one creates pathways to markets and customers, while the other creates pathways to knowledge, networks, mentorship, and collaboration.

Looking Ahead

Our next step is not simply to add more shops. It is to strengthen the digital ecosystem around Afghan women entrepreneurs so that women have better access to skills, markets, information, networks, mentors, and business opportunities.

A key priority for GWTC is to further develop MadeByAfghanWomen.com by creating a mobile application and integrating AI-enabled features that make the platform easier and more effective for both Afghan women vendors and shoppers worldwide.

For women entrepreneurs, particularly those with limited digital literacy or English-language skills, we envision technology that can simplify tasks such as creating product listings, translating and improving product descriptions, managing their shops, and communicating with potential customers. For shoppers, enhanced search, translation, product discovery, and other AI-supported features can make it easier to discover Afghan women-owned businesses and purchase their products from anywhere in the world.

Together with the Afghan Women’s Global Business Hub, these investments will help GWTC move beyond simply bringing women online toward building a stronger, more accessible, and sustainable digital ecosystem for Afghan women entrepreneurs.

135 businesses are online today. Our next challenge is to make the technology work harder for them—connecting their products, skills, and stories with markets around the world.

Links:

• The e-commerce platform for Afghan Women Businesses