Building Skills, Confidence, and New Beginnings
Through SEED’s Skills for Life program in Halabja, young people are building technical skills, confidence, and pathways to employment and entrepreneurship.
Weaving the Fabric of a Healthy Family
The HFSC program helps teens rebuild family bonds post-conflict. Muneer, Sarmat, and Adam share how it strengthened their relationships with their fathers.
Between Books and Street-Smarts: Ethics of Journalism in Iraq and Kurdistan
The media — including newspapers, television, radio, websites, and social media, through which we are exposed to or consume information from — represents a critical and powerful sphere of influence that underpins the norms, ideas, and…
Beyond Black & White Thinking: Fostering Integrative Complexity to Encourage Reintegration of Children Affected by War
ISIS systematically destroyed and terrorized communities across Iraq and Syria, breaking up families and often recruiting the most vulnerable members – children – as domestic workers, cleaners, messengers, or soldiers. These children, many…
How to Recognize & Respond to Technology Facilitated Gender-Based Violence (TFGBV)
SEED Delivers First Ever TFGBV-focused Training in Iraq for National NGOs “TFGBV is one of the most important issues we deal with, it’s common and prevalent in our society – especially in the Middle East – due to the misuse of technology…
Restoring A Sense of Safety for Returnees in Ninewa
SEED Trains over 50 NGO staff on Protection and Gender-Based Violence To date, almost 5 million Iraqis, formerly displaced by ISIS, have returned home. And while once many lived in communities that enjoyed relative safety, years of…
Gender-based Violence Training: Helping Yourself to Help Others
For Bassma and Hemin, working in a difficult environment everyday was taking its toll. The emotional strain and demand to be available at all hours of the day, was having an impact on their mental health and their relationships with their…
Growing Her Wings: SEED Girls Builds Confidence to Pursue Dreams
Home Growing Her Wings: SEED Girls Builds Confidence to Pursue Dreams Sana*, who had a keen interest in girls’ rights and advocating for girls’ education, always wanted to pursue a career as a pilot when she finished school, but lacked the…
Stringing Together Beads of Hope: Economically Empowering Survivors of Human Trafficking through Paper Bead Making
Thanks to Intira Thepsittawiwat, who donated her time and expertise, SEED Foundation supported 11 women, from 3 countries, to learn how to make paper bead necklaces. These women, while residing in SEED’s STEPS Center, were empowered with…
‘I have possibilities now,’ says Mohamad after 16 years of not knowing his birth name or true age
“I want to exist on paper to follow my dreams,” Mohamad,* a 16-year-old who was abandoned by his biological parents, told his SEED Foundation lawyer, who has been supporting Mohamad’s legal efforts to obtain his ID and other legal…
Access to Client-Centered Services Critical to Supporting Survivors of Trafficking
Tara*, 52, came to the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI) from South Asia in 2018, having been recruited for a well-paid domestic worker position. Upon arrival, her employment agency failed to obtain her residency (iqama), instead moving her…
Legal Services Play Critical Role in SEED’s Support for Trafficking Survivors
Navigating the legal system is often a complicated and lengthy process for victims, or survivors, of human trafficking. It is common in Kurdistan for them to face criminal charges instead of being recognized as survivors, leading to…
SEED’s Response To Autism
For families with children who have special needs, it can be challenging for both the family and the children to receive the support and resources they need in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. In the last two years, SEED has worked with two…
Supporting the Will of Informed Survivors of Human Trafficking
SEED supports clients from diverse backgrounds and is dedicated to taking a client-centered approach, ensuring each individual’s needs are met. Maureen, a 38-year-old woman from Tanzania, was placed in a household in Sulaimani, Kurdistan…
Therapy and Mental Health Support Help Yezidi Survivor Feel Alive Again
Nagham*, a 21 year old Yezidi girl, currently lives in an IDP camp after ISIS invaded her home town of Shingal (Sinjar), where she grew up with her family. After the ISIS invasion, life became extremely unsafe and Nagham and her family…
A Safe Space for Survivors of Trafficking During COVID-19
Shelter-in-place orders, restricted movements and government closures, necessary measures to slow the spread of the COVID-19 in Kurdistan, have resulted in a financial crisis leaving many migrant workers unemployed, and with compromised…
SEED Launches Group Therapy in Chamishko Camp
SEED continuously strives to strengthen its services to meet the needs of the communities it serves. One of the gaps that was identified was the need for a specialized group response to benefit from support of peers with similar…
Legal First in Kurdistan: Trafficking Survivor Obtains Birth Certificate
Jasmine*,26, like many migrant workers who become victims of trafficking, believed she was coming to Kurdistan via an employment agency to work and provide a better life for her family in Sierra Leone. Little did Jasmine know, she would…
PSS Sessions Fill the Voids in Camp Life
“There’s nothing to do after school, and we want more activities to do. Especially soccer,” explained a teenage boy. It was a cloudless Monday in chilly February with the sunshine filtering into a room accompanied by sounds of children…