Rob: Well, the Peace Through Business Initiative is a national
effort to help bring peace to the Middle East by equipping Afghanistan
women with entrepreneurial skills.
And as our Lacie Stockstill reports, the businesswomen spent a week
of their tour of our nation right here in Oklahoma where the idea
for the program was born.
Lacie: Oklahoma businesswomen are banding together to help their
sister entrepreneurs across the globe.
She's the president of the company.
Lacie: Five Afghanistan business women spent a week in Oklahoma as part
of their nation-wide journey to gain
entrepreneurial knowledge.
Terry Neese: These are very brave women.
They have taken six weeks away from their country, away from their family,
away from their business, to come and learn and take that knowledge back to
Afghanistan women business owners and share it.
Lacie: Oklahoma entrepreneur, Terry Neese, founded the Peace through
Business Program that is teaching these women more than strictly business.
Terry Neese: How women business owners here in Oklahoma balance their
family life, and then also see how women business owners
run their businesses.
Lacie: Ferishta Bakhteri says her experience with her Oklahoma mentor, Debra
Murray, has given her the marketing knowledge she most wished to learn.
Ferishta Bakhteri: We have been working on marketing, and practically we are
going and visiting the U S business women and
learning from their expertise.
Lacie: Murray hosted three of the participants in her home and in her business
and says the women's eagerness to learn was overwhelming.
Debra Murray: They feed on each other.
They get ideas and concepts really easily.
We went through each of their businesses and talked about how we could
apply this idea to their business.
And they had some Ah Ha moments.
Lacie: Moments that Murray believes will add to the success of women-run
businesses in Afghanistan.
Murray: There's great hope, and great optimism,
and it's fun to be a part of that.
Lacie: A part of a network of women who will continue to share their knowledge
and contribute to each other's success.