Making Ends Meet in Kafr Nabel

 

Since people lost their jobs in areas under opposition control many have sought to forge a living and end the town’s dependence on government services.

Abdullah Klido

(Kafr Nabel, Syria) – An increase in prices and a lack of work forced Abu Ahmad, 45, to leave his construction job shortly after opposition forces took control of the city of Kafr Nabel in northwestern Syria.

Abu Ahmad decided to buy a generator and began selling electricity to traders and residents in the town.

Demand for power is high as electricity from the grid only lasts for up to two hours a day.

Kafr Nabel, with a population of about 30,000, has been outside government control since August 2012.

After three years of civil war people in Syria have had little choice but to devise alternative ways of making a living. They have also been forced to reduce their reliance on public services which largely no longer exist in opposition-controlled areas.

“It all started when I bought a large diesel-powered generator,” Abu Ahmad explained. “I first supplied electricity to shops, then I progressed to supplying houses through subscription services. I make a decent living this way and provide residents with much needed power.”

Besides turning to entrepreneurs like Abu Ahmad, residents of Kafr Nabel have also found their own solutions for the lack of electricity. Some use gas lamps or small gas-powered generators. Others who can afford to, run large diesel-run generators that residents have dubbed “amperes.”

Abu Ahmad’s profits depend on the price of diesel and the number of customers he has. Like others, he struggles with high diesel prices, which in turn leads to higher costs for his services.

Some customers can only afford to buy a single unit of electricity which is not very profitable.

He also worries that his generator might be bombed, putting his whole business at risk.

Khaled al-Mahmood, 40, owns a vegetable shop and he subscribes to a similar electricity plan as that offered by Abu Ahmad.

“Yes, we have electricity now, but I receive only two units, and each unit costs seven US dollars a month,” he said. “This is a lot for me, but we have no choice because we won’t get any electricity otherwise.”

Um Ammar, 40, a housewife, has similar constraints.

“We can only pay for two units,” she said. “This means we can’t use the washing machine or the freezer. The most we can do is turn on the TV and the lights.”

Like Abu Ahmad, others have devised creative ways of earning a living by providing a vital service to local people. Ayman al-Ahmad, 35, was a police officer before he left his job after the regime cut off salaries to civil servants.

He decided to dig a well and sell water to local residents.

In several areas water infrastructure has been destroyed by bombing and vandalism causing a shortage.

Like al-Ahmad, a number of Kafr Nabel residents have invested in shallow wells.

“There were only nine government licensed shallow wells before the conflict, but now there are 82,” Farid al-Moussa, the director of the services bureau in the city’s local council, said.

According to al-Moussa, this increase is down to the number of people investing in the water business.

Due to the irregular supply, demand is high and there is money to be made.

Nazeer al-Abbas, 27, the head of programming at the Kafr Nabel-based Radio Fresh complained about the high cost of a single tank of water which cost as much as five US dollars.

“I need two tanks of water a week, which amounts to 40 dollars a month. This is half of my 80 dollar-a-month salary,” he said.

Al-Moussa says the water business has provided an essential service to both the city’s residents and those living nearby. However due to the costs involved it is difficult to provide it more cheaply.

“Their wells fill up around 2000 tanks in the city and adjacent towns,” he added.

“A tank of water costs a lot because it has to be pumped using a diesel generator and the price of fuel is high. Recently, the local council set the price of a single tank at four dollars.”

Besides investing in basic services like power and water not all new businesses are viewed so positively.

Some people have begun excavating archeological sites or looking for artifacts in order to make money.

Mahmoud and a group of his friends bought a metal detector for 4000 US dollars and began looking for valuable artifacts.

They offer metal detection services to anyone wanting to search for artifacts on their property and ask for a third of the value of whatever they find as payment.

If they find nothing, then they do not get paid. Mahmoud says this has become a popular way to make money.

“Some people work in the city and others in nearby archeological villages, and they sell the artifacts they find to traders,” he said. “We were the first since we are from this area.”

But the excavation and sale of archeological artifacts is not legal when it involves public property.

Many artifacts end up being either sold to local traders or smuggled to Turkey and sold there.

“Smuggling to Turkey is better than selling [locally],” said Mahmoud. “The prices there are high, while local traders pay very little.”

Mohammad al-Mahrouq, a former local council leader explained that the council has sought to clamp down on this practice, along with other illegal activities like logging in protected forests.

“We appointed two guards to watch over archeological sites and protect the forests from loggers,” he said.