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Mosul, Iraq. March 2021. After struggling to support her family for the past six years, Nafla Mohammad Ali is now a gardener at Al Yarmouk Park currently being transformed as part of the EU-funded area-based urban recovery programme.

Nafla and her family used to live on a chickpea plantation in the town of Batnaya, north of the  Mosul but during heavy fighting in 2014 they fled to Mosul and settled near Al Yarmouk Park.

When her husband lost his job due to spinal issues, Nafla was forced to support both of them and five children.

"If I did not work for one day, my family would have nothing to eat for lunch,” she remembers.” I was stressed and completely desperate for an opportunity.”

She came across UN-Habitat's horticulture training programme which was recruiting female gardeners as one of the initiatives under the EU-funded urban recovery programme. She says her financial situation has improved drastically.

Nafla is one of the 30 vulnerable women selected from the 410 women who applied to UN-Habitat's "Horticulture Training Programme for Women." Many of the candidates enrolled in this programme are destitute widows whose families survive on charity and food provided by the local mosques.

The initiative provided Nafla and her colleagues with an intensive 10-day long vocational training comprising core lessons in horticulture, including soil composition, plant species, planting, pruning and general maintenance. The training was held in close consultation with Agriculture Department in Mosul University, Ninewa Agriculture Department and Mosul Municipality.