Watch

Egypt Today

February 2010

Photo Credit: Mohammed Sehety

Available at: http://egypttoday.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=8825

As religious scholars and politicians debate the veil, the segregation it seems to inspire is often overlooked.

By: Ethar El-Katatney

WHEN IT COMES to Islamic dress codes, Egypt seems to be at loggerheads with itself. In recent generations, more and more women have donned some form of veil, be it hijab or niqab. The perceived political, religious and social reasons for doing so are not always welcome.

In October 2009, Sheikh Al-Azhar Mohamed Tantawi, head of the Sunni world’s most influential institution, banned the niqab in female-only classes and dormitories, saying the face veil was not an Islamic duty; Cairo University followed suit. The Ministry of Health has also pushed to prohibit nurses from wearing the niqab.

Beyond official edicts, the popularity of the veil has led to unspoken social segregation, sometimes to accommodate and sometimes to exclude muhajabat (veiled women.)

No Men Allowed…

In the past, the veil was worn mainly in the poor, rural classes. As the number of veiled women with disposable income increased, women-only services have sprung up to accommodate them, with mixed success.

“I see this trend as something very good because [...] veiled women are also members of this society with their needs,” says actress Hanan Turk, who veiled in 2006. A year later, she opened Sabaya, a combination café and hairdresser which only serves women. “You must give them alternatives to services that would have required them to interact with men.”

Shortly after it opened, rumors spread that Sabaya not only excluded men, but Christian and non-veiled women as well — claims that Turk rigorously denied. Even with Turk’s reassurances that her café welcomed all women, it never took off: Sabaya is closing for lack of customers. Yet Turk defends her business model, claiming that the café is folding because, “Society doesn’t accept that there is a sacred space just for women.”

Dr. Huda Lutfi, professor of Islamic Studies at the American University in Cairo, disagrees. “Our culture is becoming more and more superficially religious,” she says. “To reduce religion to wearing the veil and segregation is reductionist; it is not what the faith is about.”

Lutfi, who teaches a graduate course titled Veiling and the Construction of an Islamic Identity, believes that a large segment of local women who veil do so for reasons other than faith: “The hijab came into fashion in the last decade, and society pressures women to wear it, whether at work, school or home.” Thus women-only services will succeed only if they fulfill the needs of all women, not just muhajabat.

La Femme, the women-only beach in the North Coast compound of Marina, is a prime example. “Not only veiled women come to La Femme,” says Osama Amir, manager of Living Well, the company that owns La Femme. “We are a culture that values modesty, and so it gives all women a safe space to dance and laugh and swim without having anyone look at them disapprovingly. At the same time, just like men like to go to an ahwa just for men, why is it strange if women go to a place just for women?”

Critics fear, however, that voluntary segregation is spreading to other aspects of life. Last month, authorities in Alexandria began considering a women-only taxi service, following the success of Cairo’s women-only metro train cars.

In response, the Egyptian Center for Women’s Rights (ECWR) issued a strongly worded press release: “[This] project is segregation towards women and a naïve attempt to solve a problem that will in turn have dangerous effects on social and security problems [and the] participation of women in public life. [It] may extend to universities, workplaces, and other public spaces, which will contribute to the dangerous termination of development efforts.”

The push for women-only services may be driven not so much by religious conviction as by the issue of sexual harassment. A highly publicized ECWR survey indicated that 83 percent of Egyptian women are sexually harassed at least once a day.

“I’d rather go to a women-only lingerie store or be squished in the women-only carriage in the metro even if there’s space on the normal carriage, just to stop the harassment” says 26-year-old veiled public university student Reem Ahmed. “Although I wish I didn’t have to.”

…And No Muhajabat

Some businesses take the opposite approach with no-veiled staff policies. “I wish I didn’t have to enforce it but unfortunately it’s management’s rules,” says the store manager of a high-end clothing store that does not hire veiled sales staff. The manager spoke on condition of anonymity while commenting on hiring practices. “They say it’s because people are more likely to buy from non-veiled women, but I don’t understand why this is the case.”

Some women compromise by traveling to their jobs in hijab, then taking off their veils inside. “I know it’s haram what I’m doing,” says Amal El-Sayyed, a 22-year-old waitress in a restaurant, “but most of my friends do the same. And if a place is nice and lets them wear the hijab, they make them tie it behind their head Spanish style so it’s not so obvious.”

Other restaurants go even further, refusing to serve veiled clients. Although few venues will admit it, dozens of veiled women report stories of being turned away from upscale restaurants, bars and nightclubs.

Last month, popular Nile-bank restaurant Sequoia posted the following on Twitter: “Just so we can set the record straight, despite what some people at some newspapers say, we never had a ‘No hijab allowed’ policy. Sequoia reservation policy has many restrictions, but never one based on religious parameters. Muhajabat have always been welcome!”

Even so, many women have reported being told over the phone by Sequoia employees that veiled women were not allowed.

“The official policy is that there is no problem with hijab,” says Mahmoud Ashraf, Sequoia’s public relations manager. “But what happened is that the reservations desk used to see that there is alcohol served and so took it upon themselves to ask if the woman was veiled. But this will not happen anymore.”

Ashraf thinks that some may discriminate for business reasons. “Places which serve alcohol pay a lot of money for an alcohol license. So in order to mitigate the cost they prefer having clientele who will drink. The possibility of hijabis or people who hang out with hijabis drinking is low. So I think it is a purely business decision.”

There’s also the consideration that people drinking “may feel threatened with the presence of hijabis, who remind them [of religion] when they don’t want to think about it,” says Lutfi. “And if they’re uncomfortable they won’t come, which means [lost customers]. These are things an establishment has to think hard about.”

A no-veil policy also reflects socio-economic issues. Lutfi notes, “I think it is more a class thing, since the more chic hijab is more acceptable. The way women wear the hijab intersects with class. If you are wearing the latest fashion and a branded veil, then you are obviously high class.”

The unspoken assumption is that being more covered implies less social standing, which is why some women say they are asked over the phone by business establishments if they wear hijab Spanish style, a less conspicuous way of determining status.

After taking the business and social factors into account, it seems that the debate about whether the veil is a step forward or backward is actually just dancing around much deeper societal issues. et

إن جميع المسلمين “إخوة” و”أخوات” في الإسلام، ولكن عندما يتعلق الأمر بالصناعات “الحلال” فإنه لا اعتبارات أخرى في العمل…أليس كذلك؟

بقلم إيثار الكتاتني

عندما يتعلق الأمر بـ 1,8 مليار مسلم حول أنحاء العالم يتطلبون العديد من المنتجات التي تتوافق مع مبادئهم الدينية، وهي المتطلبات التي يسارع أصحاب الأعمال لتلبيتها، فيمكننا القول بأن الإسلام سلعة رائجة. وبالرغم من أن البعض يتخيلون أن سوق المنتجات الحلال العالمي لا تتعلق إلا بالطعام، فإن تلك السوق في حقيقة الأمر شاملة، حيث إنها تضم كافة قطاعات الأعمال التي ترتبط بنمط حياة المسلمين، من الملبس والسفر إلى الاقتصاد والعقارات. ولذلك تختلف تقديرات قيمة السوق حسب مجموعة المنتجات المعنية.

ويقدر معرض سنغافورة الدولي للمنتجات الحلال، وهو معرض يقام سنويًا لبيع المنتجات الحلال، القيمة السنوية للسوق الحلال بـ 560 مليار دولار (أو ما يعادل 3 تريليون جنيه مصري)، بينما يقدر معرض الحلال العالمي الذي يقام بأبو ظبي المهتم بالصناعات الحلال تلك القيمة بـ 2,1 تريليون دولار (أو ما يعادل 11,2 مليون جنيه مصري). وتقدر جريدة الحلال التي تطلق على نفسها الجريدة الرسمية لتجارة الصناعات الحلال تلك القيمة بـ 580 مليار دولار (أو ما يعادل 3,1 تريليون جنيه مصري). وأيًا كانت القيمة المقدرة، فمن الواضح أن المنتجات الحلال مشروع مربح.

وفي مصر، يلعب الدين دورًا هامًا في حياة معظم الناس. فمنذ عصر الفراعنة، تميز المصريون بالتدين العميق سواء أكانوا من الوثنيين أو المسلمين أو المسيحيين أو اليهود. وعلى الرغم من ذلك، فقد تحولت المدن الكبرى في مصر مع الاستعمار إلى مراكز عالمية أكثر من كونها مراكز دينية. واستمر ذلك الوضع حتى السبعينيات والثمانينيات من القرن العشرين عندما اجتاحت البلاد ما أطلق عليه صحوة إسلامية، وأخذت الهوية الإسلامية المحافظة تتغلب على الهوية القومية للمسلمين من سكان مصر.

وقد انعكست تلك الصحوة في عدد المساجد في مصر. فطبقًا للجهاز المركزي للتعبئة العامة والإحصاء، كان هناك في عام 1986 مسجدًا لكل 745 نسمة بالرغم من كون عدد السكان قد تضاعف تقريبًا.

واليوم، وحيث يقدر عدد المسلمين بحوالي 90% من السكان – أي حوالي 72 مليون نسمة – فإن “عودة” الإسلام نتج عنها تدفق المشروعات التجارية التي تهدف إلى تحقيق الربح من خلال الاهتمام المتزايد بالمنتجات الحلال. وتسعى تلك المشروعات التجارية إلى إشباع بعض الحاجات التي لم يكن يتم إشباعها في الماضي، وهي تتمثل في تمكين الناس من تنفيذ أوامر الإسلام في العالم المعاصر. وسواء أكان ذلك يتعلق بارتداء ملابس محتشمة وعصرية في الوقت ذاته أم أداء الحج بطريقة عصرية، فإن الشركات تتنافس على مواكبة تلك السوق المزدهرة.

وقد أجرت مجلة Business Today  المصرية حوارًا مع قادة السوق في أربع صناعات ترتبط أرباحها مباشرة بالإسلام، وذلك من أجل معرفة ماذا يحدث عندما تتداخل الدنيا مع الدين في العمل.

حجابي ستايل

بالرغم من كونهن أقلية في يوم من الأيام، فإن المحجبات قد أصبحن الآن أغلبية ساحقة في مصر. وعندما أدرك رجال الأعمال أن تلك السوق ذات احتمالية كبرى للاستثمار، سارعوا إلى صنع منتجات لإرضاء احتياجات العميلات المحجبات.

وربما تكون أول الشركات استجابةً تاي شوب، وهو محل مخصص لبيع أغطية الرأس من كافة الألوان والأنواع والأقمشة. ومن أغطية الرأس المصنوعة من المخمل إلى تلك المصنوعة من الشيفون المرصعة بالترتر أو الخرز، تخطفت تلك الأغطية من رفوف المحل.

وبالرغم من كونه سابقًا مجرد قطعة من القماش تلف مرة أو مرتين حول الرأس، فقد أصبح الحجاب الآن متأثرًا بتيار الموضة، حيث قد يستغرق ارتداء الحجاب الآن حوالي ساعة. كما أدى الحجاب أيضًا إلى ظهور تجارات أخرى مكملة، فبعض المجلات مثل مجلة حجاب المحلية تعرض صور فتيات يرتدين الحجاب بطرق مختلفة، كما أن تلك المجلات تفرد صفحات خاصة لشرح كيفية تعلم ربطات جديدة للحجاب. كما دخل مصففو الشعر أيضًا في اللعبة، حيث يمكن للمحجبة أن تقوم بزيارة مصفف الشعر لربط الحجاب بالطريقة التي ترغب بها (مثل الحجاب الأسباني)، أو يمكنها دعوة مصممي تسريحات الشعر المتخصصين إلى المنزل لربط الحجاب بأسعار تتراوح بين 100 جنيه و700 جنيه.

وماذا بعد الحجاب؟ الملابس بالطبع. فقد أصبح تزويد المرأة المسلمة المحافظة باحتياجاتها مشروعًا ضخمًا، حيث لا تبيع بعض المحلات سوى الملابس الطويلة المحتشمة ذات الرقبة العالية. ويقوم السلام شوبينج سنتر الذي يقع بالقرب من رمسيس هيلتون بتوفير احتياجات المحجبات حصريًا، حيث يبيع كل شيء من أحدث الصيحات إلى العباءات.

وتقوم بعض المحلات مثل سلسلة محلات المحجبة بإصدار تصميمات جديدة كل بضعة أشهر، كما أنها تستخدم حيلاً إعلانية مثل الاستعانة بإحدى الممثلات المشهورات اللاتي ارتدين الحجاب للإعلان عن منتجاتها الجديدة. وعلى غرار الصحوة الإسلامية، فقد انتشر ارتداء ملابس المحجبات ليشمل كافة قطاعات المجتمع، حيث تقوم العديد من ماركات الملابس الشهيرة بافتتتاح محلات تباع فيها العباءات السوداء بأسعار تبدأ من 1000 جنيه.

وربما يكون أكثر المنتجات التي ظهرت لتلبية احتياجات المحجبات نجاحًا هو القميص الضيق ذو الأكمام الطويلة والرقبة العالية الذي يأخذ شكل الجسم ويباع بـ 60 جنيهًا. وقد حققت شركة كارينا – المصنّع الرئيسي لذلك النوع – نجاحًا باهرًا لدرجة أن اسم الشركة أصبح مرادفًا لذلك النوع من الثياب. وقد افتتحت الشركة 25 فرعًا في مصر خلال 3 سنوات، وهي قصة نجاح مذهلة طبقًا لهنا يوسف – مدير التسويق بشركة كارينا التي أعلنت أن المنتج ترتديه على الأقل 90% من الفتيات والسيدات في الجامعات الحكومية.

وقد قالت السيدة هنا يوسف “قبل أن نقوم بصناعة كارينا، لم يكن باستطاعة المحجبات ارتداء أي شيء يرغبن فيه. لذلك فقد صممنا القميص الضيق ذو الأكمام الطويلة والرقبة العالية الذي يأخذ شكل الجسم والذي يمكن للمحجبات ارتداؤه تحت أي شيء يرغبن فيه ليحافظن على احتشامهن.” وتصنع منتجات كارينا من الليكرا المستورد من سويسرا الذي يتميز بالمسام التي تسمح للجلد بالتنفس وبكونه مطاطًا ومصنوعًا من قطعة واحدة ويتخذ شكل الجسم.

وتقول السيدة هنا يوسف “إننا لا نستهدف المسلمات فقط، ولكن ذلك النوع من الثياب مناسب لغير المحجبات أيضًا، فهو يفيد أي امرأة ترغب في ارتداء ملابس محتشمة. وكل ما في الأمر أن معظم عملائنا من المسلمات.”

ومع نجاح القميص التقليدي ذي الأكمام الطويلة، قامت شركة كارينا على الفور بتوسيع نشاطاتها لتشمل منتجات أخرى مماثلة، بدءًا من التي شيرت ذي الأكمام الطويلة وحتى القمصان بلا أكمام التي ترتديها الفتيات في سن الرابعة عشرة. ويشمل خط الإنتاج الآن أكثر من 60 نوعًا من أنواع الملابس الخارجية والداخلية للنساء، بدءًا من السراويل ومشدات الخصر حتى القمصان المرصعة ذات الأكمام الطويلة والحجاب.

وتمتلك كارينا ثلاثة مصانع وقسم لخدمة العملاء وفريق عمل يسافر إلى إيطاليا مرتين سنويًا لحضور معارض الأزياء. وتقول السيدة هنا يوسف أن كارينا قد تفوقت حتى على ماركة الأزياء العالمية مانجو في صناعة السراويل الفضية والذهبية “المثيرة” منذ عامين. كما تؤكد قائلة “إننا نفعل كل ما بوسعنا من أجل إصدار منتجات تعكس أحدث الصيحات.”

وبالرغم من أنها لم تفصح عن الرقم تحديدًا، فإن السيدة هنا يوسف تعترف بأن ميزانية التسويق الخاصة بشركة كارينا “ضخمة”. فقد وضعت لوحة إعلانات ضخمة فوق كوبري 6 أكتوبر لعدة شهور، كما تنتشر إعلانات كارينا المصغرة في كل مكان وتوجد منافذ بيع كارينا الصغيرة في كل مكان في البلاد. وطبقًا للسيدة هنا يوسف، فقد تفوقت كارينا على منافسيها بسهولة، وهي تقول “لا أرى أن لدينا منافسين على الإطلاق، ولكن هناك بالطبع بعض الشركات التي قامت بمحاكاتنا.”

ولأن السوق مليئة بالخيارات فيما يتعلق بالملابس، فقد وجد التجار سوقًا مصغرة تستهدف النساء الأكثر محافظة، وهي تتمثل في الخدمات التي تقدم للنساء فقط مثل قاعات الرياضة الخاصة بالسيدات والشواطئ الخاصة بالسيدات ومصففي الشعر الخاصين بالسيدات والمقاهي الخاصة بالسيدات.

وتمتلك الفنانة حنان ترك التي ارتدت الحجاب حديثًا محل صبايا، وهو محل ومصفف شعر ومقهي للسيدات فقط. وتقول حنان ترك أن المسيحيات وغير المحجبات غير مسموح لهن بالدخول، وذلك لأن هذا المشروع مبني على أسس إسلامية، ويعتبر تجميل السيدة التي تكشف عن مفاتنها ضد مبادئ الإسلام.

وتقول حنان ترك أنها تفضل التمسك بمعتقداتها عن الربح، فهي تمنع عددًا كبيرًا من الزبائن المحتملين حفاظًا على القيم التي تعتنقها. ولكن في حالات أخرى، يبدو أن الدافع مادي وليس المحافظة على القيم، فبعض المشروعات تفرض أسعارًا مبالغ فيها على العملاء الذين يرغبون في منتجات وخدمات ومواقع خاصة. فعلى سبيل المثال، تبلغ قيمة تذكرة الدخول في شاطئ لا فام النسائي في مارينا 100 جنيه. وهذا الشاطئ لا يسمح إلا بدخول السيدات فقط، ولكن ذلك لا علاقة له بالمبادئ الإسلامية، فالسيدات يذهبن هناك وهن مرتديات العباءات ثم يخلعن ملابسهن ويرتدين البكيني ويرقصن على أنغام الموسيقى، وهي الأشياء التي يعتبرها المسلمون المحافظون تتعارض مع السلوك الإسلامي القويم.

صوت الدين

في يوم من الأيام، كانت الكتب هي المصدر الوحيد المتاح للمعرفة الإسلامية، ولكنها كانت مرتفعة الثمن بالنسبة للطبقة المتوسطة من المصريين وكان جزء كبير من المجتمع ما زال أميًا. وغالبًا ما كان الرجال يفضلون ارتياد المساجد من أجل الاستماع إلى خطب الشيوخ.

ولكن لم تكن هناك طريقة لإعادة الاستماع للخطبة لاحقًا أو تسجيلها لمن لم يتمكنوا من الاستماع إليها. وبالرغم من دخول الكاسيت إلى مصر في الستينيات من القرن العشرين، فلم يكن متاحًا سوى شرائط القرآن، وذلك لأن الأزهر لم يكن يعطِ رخصة لتسجيل المحاضرات خوفًا من انتشار مثل تلك المحاضرات. وقد نتج عن ذلك قيام الباعة بتسجيل الشرائط بشكل منفصل وبيعها خفية. ولكن الحاج إبراهيم الطبلاوي غير كل ذلك.

أنشأ الحاج إبراهيم الطبلاوي ابن قارئ القرآن المشهور الشيخ محمود الطبلاوي شركة مسك للتسجيلات الإسلامية في بداية الثمانينيات من القرن العشرين من أجل تسجيل المحاضرات التي يلقيها والده. واستمر في ذلك الطريق لفترة يقوم بتسجيل محاضرات والده وبعض الشيوخ الآخرين من خلال معارف والده. واستمر الوضع كذلك حتى عام 1991. وفي يوم من الأيام كان يركب السيارة مع صديق له فاستمع إلى محاضرة على شريط كاسيت عن وفاة الرسول (صلى الله عليه وسلم) للشيخ محمد حسان. وعندما استفسر عن مكان إنتاج تلك المحاضرة، وجد أنها قد أنتجت بشكل غير قانوني.

يقول الطبلاوي “لذلك فقد تساءلت لماذا لا نفعل ذلك بشكل قانوني؟ على الأقل يجب أن نحاول. لذلك فقد أخذت الشريط وذهبت إلى الأزهر وأخبرتهم عما أريد أن أفعله. وكانت تلك المرة الأولى التي يفكر فيها أحد في مثل تلك الفكرة، فطلب مني المدير العام وقتًا للتفكير في ذلك الأمر. وعندما عدت إليه بعد أسبوع، طلب مني أن ألخص النقاط الرئيسية في الشريط وأعطيه نسختين من الورق ونسختين من الشريط. وفعلت ذلك وبعد 20 يومًَا أعطوني التصريح.”

ولكي يتفادى المشاكل، حصل الطبلاوي أيضًا على ترخيص من وزارة الثقافة. وكانت تلك بداية تدفق الطوفان. ويقول الطبلاوي “كان رد الفعل هائلاً.” فقد تخطف الناس شريط محاضرة الشيخ محمد حسان، وهو الشريط الوحيد الذي كان يباع بشكل قانوني. وكتبت الصحف أنه كان أكثر الشرائط مبيعًا في البلد.

ولكن شيئًا فشيئًا أصبح السوق متشبعًا. وقام التجار الذين كانوا يبيعون منتجاتهم خفية بمحاكاة الطبلاوي، فأصبحت المنافسة شديدة. وفي ذلك العام في معرض الكتاب الدولي الذي يقام سنويًا بأرض المعارض بمدينة نصر، خصص قسم كبير للشرائط والكتب الدينية. وفي ذروة نجاحها، كانت صناعة الشرائط تدر ربحًا للطبلاوي يبلغ 20%. ولكن لم يكن في الإمكان تحقيق ربح أكبر من ذلك، فالشرائط الإسلامية كانت تباع بسعر يتراوح بين 95 قرشًا و1,35 جنيهًا مقارنة بالشرائط الغنائية الأكثر ربحًا التي تباع بسعر يتراوح بين 5 و10 جنيهات للشريط الواحد.

ويوضح الطبلاوي قائلاً “في بداية الأمر، كان المنحنى عاليًا لأن السوق كانت جديدة، وكان هناك طفرة كبيرة في الإنتاج. ثم قل الكم الذي تنتجه كل شركة بسبب زيادة عدد المنافسين في السوق.”

ومع تزايد شعبية الداعية التليفزيوني عمرو خالد في عام 2000، ازدهرت صناعة الشرائط الإسلامية. فقد هرع العديد من الناس لشراء شرائط عمرو خالد، كما زادت مبيعات شرائط القرآن وشرائط المحاضرات الأخرى. وبالرغم من كون حقوق النسخ لشرائط عمرو خالد محفوظة لشركة النور، وهي قائدة السوق الحالية، فإن الأرباح تدفقت إلى منتجي الشرائط الآخرين. وارتفعت مبيعات الشرائط بصورة جنونية، وتغير العملاء من كبار السن في المناطق الريفية للشباب من كافة قطاعات المجتمع.

وبالرغم من ذلك، فإن العديد من الشركات تحصل على أرباحها الآن من تصنيع الشرائط وليس من التسجيلات الجديدة للشيوخ. وتقوم شركة مسك بتفويض شركات أخرى للإنتاج، وتحاول في الوقت ذاته إحضار شيوخ جدد من كافة أنحاء العالم، ولكن الشركة ومنافسيها لم يعودوا يحققوا أرباحًا كبيرة. ويقول الطبلاوي أنه مع اختراع الأقراص المضغوطة (السي دي) التي تقصر مبيعات التسجيلات على الموسرين (وذلك لأن الريفيين ما زالوا متمسكين بالشرائط) ومع ظهور الأقمار الصناعية، فإن تلك السوق لن تنمو أكثر من ذلك.

ويوضح قائلا “لدينا الآن الأقمار الصناعية، وأصبح الناس لديها القدرة على الوصول للتسجيلات الصوتية والمرئية[1] في كافة القنوات، وهم يرونهم ]الشيوخ[ كل يوم، بل يمكنهم أيضًا التحدث إليهم على الهواء مباشرة. وحتى بالنسبة للاستماع للقرآن، هناك قناة المجد التي يمكن للناس الاستماع للقرآن من خلالها. وهكذا، فقد اختلف الأمر." ولكي يستمر الطبلاوي في السوق، فسوف يدخل مجال المصحف الإلكتروني المحمول، وهو يؤكد أنه سوف يستمر في مجال إنتاج الشرائط بالرغم من تناقص الربح، وذلك لأنه يشعر أنه "يقدم شيئًا مفيدًا للمسلمين".

ويضيف الطبلاوي قائلاً "لا يهم نوع العمل الذي تزاوله. فقد يوجد من يطلق لحيته ويرتدي الجلباب لكنه يسرق، وما يهم هو النية. وطالما أن المنتج الذي تقدمه ليس حرامًا، يمكنك أن تفعل أي شيء. فعلى سبيل المثال، لا يمكنك العمل في صناعة الخمور أو القمار وفي الوقت ذاته تدعي أنك "تعمل بضمير". وكون عملي مرتبطًا بالدين لا يجب أن يكون أمرًا ذا بال، فيجب على المرء أن يكون أمينًا في كل ما يفعله، وعندها يطرح الله البركة في عمله. فعلى سبيل المثال، إذا كنت تعمل في مجال العقارات، فقد تخبر أحد الأشخاص أن تلك الشقة مساحتها 200 متر بينما مساحتها الحقيقية 150 مترًا فقط. وعليك أن تستخدم نفس المعايير في أي عمل تقوم به. وهناك حديث نبوي شريف يقول "إن المفلس من أمتي، يأتي يوم القيامة بصلاة وصيام وزكاة، ويأتي قد شتم هذا، وقذف هذا، وأكل مال هذا، وسفك دم هذا، وضرب هذا[2]…“

الموسيقى الحلال

بالرغم من كون شرائط المحاضرات الإسلامية وشرائط القرآن في تناقص، فإن نوعًا آخر من الشرائط الإسلامية تزداد شعبيته وهو الأناشيد أو الأغاني الإسلامية. ويزداد عدد الفرق الإسلامية التي تظهر على الساحة كل يوم، ولكن رائد ذلك المجال بالطبع هو سامي يوسف.

وقد عثر بارا خريجي، وهو شريك في تأسيس شركة الصحوة الإسلامية للتسجيلات الموسيقية وصديق سامي يوسف منذ الطفولة، بالمصادفة على تلك السوق المربحة: الشباب الذين يريدون الاستماع إلى الموسيقى ولكنهم في الوقت ذاته يخشون أن كلمات الأغاني التي تدور حول الجنس والعنف محرمة. وقد رأى خريجي أن تلك السوق ينقصها الكثير من الخدمات، لذلك فقد انقض عليها مع شريكه شريف حسن البنا. ونظرًا لقلة الخيارات المتاحة لأولئك الذين يرغبون في الاستماع إلى نوع مختلف من الموسيقى، حقق ألبوم سامي يوسف “المعلم” الذي أصدر عام 2003 نجاحًا باهرًا، حيث بيع منه الملايين من النسخ، ويبدو أن نغمات أغانيه أصبحت رنات الهاتف المحمول في مصر بأكملها. كما أن ألبومه الثاني “أمتي” بيع منه أكثر من ثلاثة ملايين نسخة في كافة أنحاء العالم.

ولم يقم خريجي فقط بتقديم ذلك النوع من الموسيقى الإسلامية الحديثة، ولكنه أيضًا أنشأ أول فيديو كليب غنائي إسلامي، وكان رد الفعل مدهشًا. وقد تم تصوير أغنية سامي يوسف “حسبي ربي” في أربعة دول مختلفة: المملكة المتحدة والهند وتركيا ومصر، وهو حدث فريد من نوعه في تاريخ الفيديو كليب الغنائي كما يؤكد خريجي. وقد احتلت تلك الأغنية أعلى المراكز في القنوات التليفزيونية في كافة أنحاء العالم، وأصبحت تذاع على أشهر قنوات الأغاني العربية، بما فيها أكثر قنوات الأغاني شعبية في العالم العربي: ميلودي ومزيكا. والنتيجة؟ بيعت خمسة ملايين نسخة من ألبومات سامي يوسف في العالم كله وأصبح له 16 مليون نتيجة عند البحث على صفحات الإنترنت.

ويقول موقع الإنترنت الخاص بالشركة “بدلاً من اتباع نفس الطريق الذي اتخذه منافسونا، فإن تسجيلات الصحوة تهدف إلى وضع معايير جديدة بكل الطرق الممكنة، وذلك عن طريق احترام الماضي مع النظر إلى المستقبل. ونحن نرغب في تقديم رؤية عصرية تتسم بالحيوية للإسلام من خلال منتجاتنا.” ويؤيدها خريجي في ذلك الرأي، حيث يقول “إن منتجاتنا ذات جودة عالية، فهي ذات هدف ترفيهي وتعليمي وروحاني.]…[ ومن خلال ألبومات الموسيقى الإسلامية، تسعى شركة الصحوة إلى إعادة تعريف مصطلح "إسلامي" بحيث يشمل "كل ما هو جيد" ويوضح توافق الحياة العصرية مع الإسلام."

وقد أصبحت تسجيلات الصحوة أحد قادة السوق، وهي تتمتع باسم تجاري قوي، فهي تتلقى عروضًا من فنانين طموحين يوميًا وتتمتع بشبكة توزيع تغطي 52 دولة من أذربيجان إلى أستراليا. وقد أصبحت الشركة الآن مؤسسة تحمل اسم مجموعة الصحوة الموسيقية، وينضوي تحتها ثلاث شركات تابعة لها.

وقد قامت تسجيلات الصحوة بالحصول على شراكات مع شركات النقل الدولية DHL وUPS، وهي تمتلك المخازن والاستديوهات الخاصة بها، بالإضافة إلى موقع الإنترنت www.awakening.com، مع تسهيلات التجارة الإلكترونية التي كما يقول خريجي "تمكننا من البيع مباشرة للجمهور دون وسيط، مما يزيد من الأرباح." وتمتلك الشركة الآن ثلاثة مكاتب حول أنحاء العالم، ويقع فرع الشرق الأوسط في مصر، وهو يضم ستوديو تسجيل داخلي مصمم خصيصًا. وحتى الآن، قامت تسجيلات الصحوة بضم ثلاثة عشر فنانًا وإصدار ستة ألبومات وإقامة أكثر من 150 حفلة والحصول على دعم من الشركات تبلغ قيمته مليون دولار (أو ما يعادل 5,35 مليون جنيه) من الشركات متعددة الجنسيات وعقد صفقات توزيع مع شركة أفلام باراماونت وآي تيونز وموسيقى MSN وفيرجين، كما حصت على رعاية شركة فودافون متعددة الجنمسيات للاتصالات لأغاني الفيديو الكليب الخاصة بسامي يوسف على القنوات الفضائية.

افتح القنوات الفضائية

قد تكون البرامج الدينية في القنوات الفضائية ساهمت في إضعاف صناعة الشرائط، ولكن صناعة التليفزيون نفسها في ازدهار مستمر في كافة أنحاء العالم. ومن الطريف أن كلمة "اقرأ"، وهي أول كلمة من القرآن نزلت على الرسول (صلى الله عليه وسلم)، هي أيضًا اسم أول قناة دينية أسسها الشيخ صالح كامل.

وقد بدأ بث تلك القناة المجانية عام 1998، وأصبحت أحد عمالقة السوق. فقبل ذلك، لم تكن هناك أي قناة مخصصة بالكامل لتزويد المشاهدين بالبرامج الدينية والترفيهية. وتنتشر مكاتب اقرأ الخمسة في الشرق الأوسط، حيث يقع الاستديوهان الرئيسيان في السعودية ومصر، بينما تقع المكاتب الأخرى في الأردن ولبنان والكويت. ولمدة 6 أعوام، قامت قناة اقرأ باحتكار السوق، وطبقًا لإحصائية أجريت بواسطة مجلس الوزراء المصري، كانت قناة اقرأ أكثر القنوات الفضائية مشاهدة في مصر عام 2004.

وتقدم قناة اقرأ برامج دينية تعالج موضوعات متعلقة بكافة جوانب المجتمع، مثل المرأة والأسرة والفتاوى وبرامج المكالمات على الهواء وكيفية قراءة القرآن في أربعة قارات من العالم. وبالرغم من أن العديد من المنافسين أطلقوا قنوات مشابهة، تبقى قناة اقرأ أكثر قناة مشهورة ولها معجبيها المخلصين.

ويعمل محمد سلام المدير التنفيذي لقناة اقرأ في السعودية في القناة منذ افتتاحها، وهو يقول "لقد أنشئت قناة اقرأ لخدمة قطاع من المجتمع لم يكن يشاهد التليفزيون، حيث إنهم كانوا يعتقدون أنه يتعارض مع القواعد ]الأخلاقية[. ولكننا اكتشفنا بعد ثلاثة سنوات وفوجئنا بأن مجموعات مختلفة من الناس يشاهدون برامجنا، وليس فقط المتحفظين." واستجابة لذلك، بدأت قناة اقرأ في تقديم برامج تناسب جمهورًا أكبر من الناس بحثٵ عن زيادة عدد مشاهديها.

وفي عام 2004، بدأت قنوات إسلامية جديدة في الظهور، بدءًا من قناة المجد والرسالة التي تقدم برامج دينية تستهدف مجموعات مختلفة من المشاهدين على غرار قناة اقرأ. كما أنشئت أيضًا قناة الفجر، وهي قناة مخصصة لقراءة القرآن فقط. واليوم يوجد حوالي 30 منافسًا آخرين في هذا المجال، وهي لا تنطلق فقط من الشرق الأوسط مثل قناة الإسلام اليوم في أوروبا وبريدجز في أمريكا، وهما مثالان على القنوات غير الشرق أوسطية.

ويقول سلام "ولكنني أرى كل تلك القنوات متنافسين في الخير." وطبقًا للتقارير الشهرية التي يتلقاها سلام من شركات الأبحاث، لم تعد قناة اقرأ ضمن القنوات العشرة الأعلى مشاهدة في الشرق الأوسط. ويقول سلام واصفًا تأثير المنافسة المتزايدة وخيارات المشاهدة "عندما تحصل على المركز الرابع من ضمن خمس قنوات دينية يختلف الأمر عن الحصول على المركز التاسع من ضمن ثلاثين قناة دينية."

ويضيف قائلاً "ولكننا لاحظنا أن ]مشاهدينا[ يتميزون بالولاء، وأن مفهوم الاسم التجاري ]جيد[ جدًا. وينسب الفضل لقناة اقرأ في رفع الوعي الإسلامي بين الناس في العالم العربي والإسلامي. فمنذ عشرة أعوام، لم يكن أحد من الناس لديه أدنى فكرة عن السيرة النبوية."

ويوضح سلام أن المشاهدين الأوائل كانوا متعطشين لسماع أي شيء، وكانوا يسعدون بالاستماع إلى أي شيخ يتحدث أمام الكاميرا. ولكن الآن كي تبقى داخل المنافسة، يجب على قناة اقرأ الحفاظ على اهتمام المشاهدين الذين لديهم العديد من القنوات للاختيار بينها، وفي الوقت ذاته أصبح لديهم معلومات أكثر ولذلك أصبحوا أكثر انتقاء فيما يشاهدون.

ويقول سلام "الآن علينا أن نستضيف أشخاصًا معينين ]يتوقعهم الناس[ . وقد قمنا بتغيير بعض جوانب تقديم برامجنا، فالآن يمكن إحضار بعض الضيوف في الاستوديو كي يشاركوا في النقاش، كما أننا ]نقدم بعض الأفكار الجديدة[ مثل برنامج معز مسعود الأخير الذي قام بتصويره في الشارع. ويجب علينا البحث عن طرق جديدة أكثر إثارة لإعجاب ]مشاهدينا[."

ويقول سلام "تستهدف قناة اقرأ كل الأشخاص، من كبار العائلة إلى المتزوجين حديثًا والشيوخ والصغار والكبار." وتستخدم القناة الاستفتاءات عبر الإنترنت والبريد الإلكتروني والإفادة بالرأي عن طريق الهاتف ومجموعات الدراسة ومبيعات الشرائط والكتب لمعرفة الشيوخ الأكثر طلبًا. فمن المعروف أن بعض الشيوخ أكثر شعبية من غيرهم، وبعضهم أكثر تحفظًا من غيرهم. فهل تختار القنوات الشيوخ الذين تستضيفهم؟

ويقول سلام "لا بد أن يوجد الاختلاف في الرأي، وإلا فلن تكن هناك أربعة مذاهب فقهية. وعلينا أن نعطي كل شخص ما يريده، فنحن لا نسمح لقناتنا بأن تتحرك في اتجاه واحد فقط كي ترضي نمطًا واحدًا من المسلمين."

وبالرغم من كونها أصبحت اسمًا معروفًا، فإن قناة اقرأ لا تحقق ربحًَا، بل إنها في الحقيقة لا تغطي حتى تكاليفها، فهي لا تغطي إلا نصف تكاليف إدارتها تقريبًا. ويكمن السر وراء استمرار مثل تلك القناة بالرغم من الخسائر في ارتباطها بالدين.

يقول سلام "إن قناة اقرأ ليست مشروعًا هادفًا للربح، ولكنها مشروع دعوي إسلامي إنساني ضخم. ونحن محظوظون للمشاركة في مثل هذا المشروع الرائع، كما أننا نحصل أيضًا على مقابل مادي، فالشيخ صالح كامل مؤسس القناة يغطي الخسائر ويعتبر ذلك إسهامًا شخصيًا منه في الدعوة."

وبالرغم من أن سلام يعترف بأن النفقات يمكن تقليلها وأن الميزانية الضخمة المخصصة لمجالات مختلفة مثل التسويق يمكن تخفيضها، فإنه يرجع الخسائر إلى أن الإعلانات التجارية في القنوات الدينية غير مربحة مثل نظيراتها في القنوات الترفيهية. وماذا عن شريط الرسائل القصيرة المزعج في أسفل الشاشة؟ عندما توجهنا إليه بذلك السؤال، هز كتفيه باستهجان وقال "إنه لا يجلب سوى بعض الملاليم."

ولا يوجد طريقتان لتفسير الأمر، ففي هذا المشروع على ما يبدو (على الأقل بالنسبة لشخص واحد) تعتبر أهداف الربح ثانوية بالنسبة للهدف النهائي وهو زيادة الوعي والمعرفة الإسلامية. وبالرغم من أن ميزانية التسويق المخصصة لقناة اقرأ ضخمة وتتضمن الإعلان في وسائل الإعلام وخارجها، فإن الهدف يتجاوز الربح المادي. ويقول سلام "عندما نقوم بالإعلان أو الترويج للقناة، لا يكون ذلك فقط للمكاسب المادية، ولكننا ]نرسل رسالة[ ونقوم بنشر الأيديولوجية الخاصة بنا."

ويوجد بعض الجدل المثار حول ما إذا كان الشيوخ الذين يظهرون في برامج التليفزيون يعتنقون نفس الأيديولوجية فيما يتعلق بتحقيق الربح من واجباتهم الدينية.

وبالرغم من أن أرباح الدعاة والشيوخ غير معروفة بالضبط، فقد حاولت الصحافة المصرية تقدير دخلهم. ففي سبتمبر الماضي، أعلنت جريدة أخبار البرلمان أن عمرو خالد يتقاضى 2 مليون جنيه عن كل برنامج جديد. وفي نفس الشهر، أعلنت جريدة المسائية المصرية أن كلاً من محمد حسين يعقوب ومحمد حسان (وهو أول شيخ تصدر له شرائط بشكل قانوني في مصر) يربح 100000 جنيه شهريًا، بينما يربح خالد الجندي 60000 جنيه شهريًا، ويحصل الشيخ يوسف القرضاوي على 10000 مقابل الظهور في أي برنامج. وهذه الأرقام مشكوك في صحتها بشكل كبير، فالجريدة الثانية المذكورة أعلنت أن عمرو خالد لا يتقاضى أموالاً في مقابل عمله.

وتختلف تقديرات فوربس أرابيا لتلك الأرقام، ففي مارس أعلنت المجلة ان عمرو خالد أغنى داعية إسلامي في العالم، حيث قدرت دخله في عام 2007 بحوالي 2,5 مليون دولار (أو ما يعادل 13,4 مليون جنيه مصري)، ولكن عمرو خالد أنكر هذا الرقم من خلال الصحف وبشكل شخصي.

وفي قائمة فوربس، جاء في المركز التالي لعمرو خالد الداعية الكويتي طارق السويدان الذي قدر صافي دخله بحوالي مليون دولار (أو ما يعادل 5,35 مليون جنيه مصري). وجاء في المركز الثالث الشيخ السعودي عائض القرني مؤلف الكتاب الشهير "لا تحزن"، حيث قدر دخله بحوالي 533000 دولار (أو ما يعادل 2,9 مليون جنيه مصري). وجاء في المركز التالي الداعية المصري المقيم في الإمارات عمر عبد الكافي، حيث قدر دخله بحوالي 373000 دولار (أو ما يعادل 2 مليون جنيه مصري) ثم السعودي سلمان العودة الذي قدر دخله بحوالي 267000 دولار (أو ما يعادل 1,4 مليون جنيه مصري). وقد قدرت فوربس صافي الدخل بناء على مجموعة من المصادر منها أجر الظهور في التليفزيون وحقوق الملكية الفكرية من التسجيلات والأرباح التي يحصلون عليها من مبيعات الكتب.

ويقول سلام "إنني أؤمن بأنه لا مشكلة في استفادة الشيوخ والدعاة والعلماء ماديًا من الظهور في التليفزيون أو إلقاء المحاضرات أو السفر. بل على العكس، فمن الضروري أن ]نعطيهم مقابلاً ماديًا جيدًا[. فعندما أضمن للداعية دخلاً كافيًا له ولأسرته ومستوى معيشي مناسب، لن يكون مثقلاً ]بالهموم[ حول المعيشة، وبالتالي سوف يكون مجهزًا بشكل أفضل لممارسة الدعوة وقراءة الكتب والمساهمة. ثم إن لاعبي الكرة والمطربين والممثلين يحصلون على الملايين، والشيوخ أيضًا يمتهنون مهنة مطلوبة، فلذلك لا مشكلة في إعطائهم ما يريدون وأكثر."

وبالنسبة لقناة اقرأ، يتوقع سلام ازدياد جمهور القناة في المستقبل. "فقد مل الناس التفاهات، فماذا يمكنهم أن يشاهدوا؟ ماذا يشاهدون بعد الفيديو كليب ومسلسلات التليفزيون ومباريات كرة القدم؟ سوف ]يبدأون بمشاهدتنا[."

السياحة الدينية

ربما تكون الصناعة الأشهر في تحقيق الربح هي السياحة الدينية التي تتضمن رحلات الحج والعمرة. ونظرًا لأن الحج أحد أركان الإسلام الخمسة والعمرة طقس ديني مقدس، فإن عدد الناس الذين يذهبون للحج يزداد كل عام بالآلاف. ففي العام الماضي، ذهب حوالي 2 مليون شخص لتأدية فريضة الحج. بل إن الأمر يتجاوز ذلك، فقد أنشئت صناعات صغيرة لتلبية احتياجات الحجاج، بما فيها حلاقين مخصصين بجوار الكعبة لمساعدة الحجاج في تأدية شعائر الحلق والتقصير ومذابح مخصصة لذبح الأضحيات المطلوبة في الحج.

ويتكلف الحج على الأقل 18000 جنيه، بينما تصل تكلفة الحج السياحي إلى 120000 جنيه. ويقوم أشرف شيحة مالك ومؤسس شركة هانوفي ترافل، وهي وكالة خمس نجوم للسياحة الدينية مقرها في مصر، بتنظيم رحلات الحج من الطراز الفاخر. فبعد التخرج وتأدية الخدمة العسكرية، عمل أشرف شيحة في شركة ثلاث نجوم للسياحة الدينية لعدة سنوات. وبعد أن تعلم أسرار العمل وعقد علاقات شخصية قوية، افتتح شركة هانوفي ترافل منذ 19 عامًا مع مجموعة من أصدقائه.

يقول شيحة "لقد صممنا على تحقيق هذا الأمر ورأينا أنه علينا التركيز والتخصص والتميز عن بقية المنافسين. وقد اخترنا مجال ]السياحة الدينية[ لأنه لا ينقطع أبدًا. وبمرور الأعوام، زادت مصداقيتنا وأصبحنا الآن أكثر شركة معروفة في هذا المجال."

وتتضمن الرحلات التي تنظمها شركة هانوفي رحلات شهرية للعمرة، ما عدا شهر رمضان الذي تنظم فيه أربع رحلات وشهر شعبان الذي تنظم فيه رحلتين من أجل تلبية الطلب المتزايد. وفي الأعوام الأخيرة، يؤكد شيحة أن هانوفي حصلت على أعلى عدد من حجوزات الطيران في الخطوط الجوية السعودية ومصر للطيران، كما أن حوائط مكتبه مغطاة بشهادات التقدير التي حصل عليها من الخطوط الجوية والفنادق.

ويقول شيحة أن فريق العمل المكون من ثلاثين شخصًا في القاهرة يعمل بدقة شديدة من أجل تلبية رغبات خمسة آلاف عميل كل عام. كما يضيف قائلاً "يقول الناس أننا نفرض أسعارًا باهظة، ولكن العميل يحصل على ما يدفع ثمنه. وهناك الكثير من مستويات الأسعار في السوق، وكل يختار المستوى الذي يريده." وبالرغم من النقد العاصف الموجه للارتفاع اللانهائي في أسعار الحج، يؤكد شيحة أنه لو لم يكن العملاء راضين عن الأسعار والخدمات فلن يكون هناك قائمة انتظار للحج مكونة من 400 شخص، كما أنه يعزو ذلك الارتفاع إلى ارتفاع الأسعار بشكل عام في تلك الصناعة، حيث يقول "إذا كان الهيلتون يعطيني الغرف مقابل 30000 ريال (42725 جنيه مصري) في أحد الأعوام وفي العام التالي تزيد القيمة إلى 46000 ريال (65000 جنيه مصري)، فليس ذلك خطأي." ويتراوح هامش الربح الذي يحققه شيحة بين 3,5 و4%، بالرغم من أنه يؤكد أن ذلك الهامش يجب أن يكون 10%.

"إن هامش الربح الخاص بي ثابت. وعندما رأيت أن الأسعار قد ارتفعت، لم أشعر أنه بإمكاني رفع الأسعار أكثر من ذلك. ووجهة نظري في ذلك أن تحقيق نسبة عالية من الربح ليس دائمًا المعيار الأهم، ولكن هدفي إرضاء العملاء."

هل ينبع ذلك الاعتقاد بأن الأمر متعلق بالإسلام؟ يجيب على ذلك السؤال قائلاً "بالطبع، فنحن نحاول إرضاء ]العملاء[ ويسعدنا أن نعمل بجد أكثر لأننا نحصل على الثواب في الدنيا والآخرة. ]وكوني أقدم شيئًا للإسلام[ يجعلني أشعر بالرضا عن نفسي، كما أشعر أن الله قد خلقني مستعدًا للقيام بتلك المهمة، ولذلك فإني أؤديها بعناية شديدة."

وبالنسبة للاتهام الآخر بأن الحج مع شركة هانوفي يشبه قضاء أجازة على مستوى خمس نجوم، حيث توجد موائد عامرة بالكابوريا ويقضي الحجاج أوقاتهم في الخيام يتحادثون في أيام العبادة، يرد شيحة على ذلك الاتهام بأنه يحاول منع الحج من التحول إلى مجرد مناسبة احتفالية عن طريق تقديم تجربة دينية شاملة للعملاء، بما فيها تنظيم الخطب في وقت الحج. ويضيف قائلاً "إنني أحاول الوصول إلى شيوخ يرضون جميع الأذواق، فواحد للفتاوى وآخر للقرآن والدعاء وثالث للحديث العام. وبقدر الإمكان، أهتم بالجانب الديني مثلما أهتم بالجانب الإداري."

هل يرى شيحة أن هناك تناقضًا في المرور بتجربة من المفترض أن تكون باعثة على التواضع في طائرة خاصة؟ يرد على ذلك قائلاً "إنني أقوم بإرضاء شريحة معينة من المجتمع. أوليس من الأفضل لنا ]في مصر[ أن نقوم بتلبية تلك الاحتياجات بدلاً من يأتي أحد من الخارج ليفعلها؟ فقد كان بعض الناس يحضرون طائرات خاصة من سويسرا، فلم لا ننشئ منتجات لشريحة معينة مستهدفة لديها القدرة على شراء تلك المنتجات؟” وفي نهاية الأمر، يقول شيحة أنه يقدم خدمة للعملاء، وما إذا كانت تلك الخدمة مبالغ فيها وباهظة التكلفة أم لا فذلك أمر لا علاقة له بالموضوع.

لقد انتبه العالم بما فيه مصر للسوق الإسلامية الكبيرة والتي ما زالت قابلة للاستغلال. والصناعات المذكورة في هذا المقال لا تمثل إلا جزءًا ضئيلاً من الحقيقة، فمن الاقتصاد الإسلامي وصناعة الموالد للكتب والمدارس الإسلامية تعتبر السوق صناعة هائلة لديها القدرة على النمو.

وتشترك صناعة الحلال في بعض الأسس مع بعض القطاعات الأخرى، ولكن الحكمة القديمة التي تقول بأنه “لا توجد اعتبارات أخرى في العمل” ليست صحيحة تمامًا. فبالنسبة لبعض الناس في المشروعات المتعلقة بالإسلام، تشكل حقيقة ارتباط العمل بالإيمان فارقًا كبيرًا، مما يتيح لهم تجاوز الربح المادي للخدمات التي يقدمونها إلى شيء أكبر مما يمكن للمال أن يشتريه.

Photo Credit: Ethar El-Katatney
Available at: http://www.egypttoday.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=8761

El-Koshary Today, the nation’s first news satire website serves up heavy topics with a light-hearted approach

By: Ethar El-Katatney

Start with chickpeas, rice, lentils and pasta. Add some garlic and vinegar, and douse generously with tomato sauce. Top it all off with a garnish of caramelized onions. What do you get? The culinary hodgepodge known as koshary.

Inspired by the meal, three men have launched the nation’s first satirical news site, El Koshary Today (EKT), spoofing the country’s current events with fictitious news stories and advertisements. Writing in English under the pen names Makarona (pasta), Ward Zeyada (extra fried onions) and Subar Lox (referring to the standard size container for koshary), the trio of 25 year olds hopes that a humorous approach to serious topics will engage more people and perhaps spur change in the country.

“Koshary is an incredible invention. It’s such a random mix of uniquely Egyptian ingredients,” says Zeyada, who, like his colleagues, would only be identified by his pen name. “We wanted a name that was very Egyptian, quite humorous and described what we do. So, like the dish, EKT is a random mix of uniquely Egyptian ‘infogrediants’.”

The idea for EKT had been brewing for over five years. The three childhood friends were all born and raised in Egypt and went to university abroad. By day, Makarona is a journalist, Zeyada a computer graphics designer, and Lox an artist. They had always wanted to start a progressive magazine, but difficulties raising capital and logistical obstacles forced them online.

Written with tongue-in-cheek humor and biting wit, EKT’s news stories are recognizably fake (stories such as “Swine Flu Mutates into Flying Pig Flu” or commentary from Paris Hilton on Egyptian presidential politics), but they touch on real topics in the region, including sexual harassment, political corruption, pollution, economic woes and religious conservatism.

Making Problems Palatable

Satire, the art of mocking with the intent of change, is not everyone’s cup of tea. However, the founders of EKT see it as an effective way to make an impact.

“If you laugh at something, you’ll tell it to someone else,” says Zeyada. “So more people will talk. But if you depress people — say talk about bread lines or Palestine on TV — they just don’t want to think about it. Satire allows us to constructively criticize Egypt’s problems and culture in a way people engage with.”

“Satire allows people to look at something from a different angle,” says Makarona. “And when they see it from a different angle they’re more likely to come up with a solution [Plus] they get informed. Look at something like Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show.”

An April 2007 study by the Pew Research Center stated that regular viewers of The Daily Show, the self-proclaimed fake news show airing on Comedy Central in the US, were usually more knowledgeable about news than audiences of other news sources.

Shaheen Pasha, a former CNN reporter and currently a visiting professor at the American University in Cairo teaching digital journalism says, “A satire show like The Daily Show does the job which normal media does, but gets the news out in a way that entertains people so they don’t get turned off. [However] it’s very subtle and you either love it or hate it. EKT will offend people but that’s how dialogue starts. It’s how you move to the next sphere of journalism.”

EKT’s tagline is “Egypt’s most reliable news source,” a clear reference to the famous news satire website The Onion, whose tagline is “America’s most reliable news source.”

“The Onion is a huge inspiration,” says Zeyada. “They’re the perfect example of how satire works. But they’ve only got the onions — we got the whole koshary.”

EKT divvies its infogredients into several categories — features, international, opinion, arts, science & technology, sports, mind & soul and el-kemala (in koshary-speak, the smaller portion to top off the meal). The ‘Abetaizar’ offers headlines such as “Man sues West for lack of shattafat (toilet hoses, similar to a bidet).” There are also reader polls and a fake classifieds section that at press time mocked football passions with ads such as, “Bloodied rock! Had to sort through the rubbish outside the Algerian team’s hotel to get this one! 100 percent guaranteed Algerian blood on rock. [] Hurry for this piece of history!”

“Our aim is to make the country better, by spreading real information through a humorous medium,” says Makarona. “We’re all familiar with traffic and torture, but through EKT you’ll think about them in a [different way]. We mock shamelessly but for good reason. But we’ll try and distinguish between making fun of an idea and the reasons behind it versus belittling.”

With this mentality, EKT mock-headlines such as “Egypt’s Elite Declare Independence from Egypt” and “Egyptian Woman gets Travel Visa in Record Six Months” take on a larger purpose.

“If we’re not willing to accept criticism of our own societies then it’s going to be very hard to change [them],” Zeyada says. “We’re not critiquing from the outside — we’re born and raised in Egypt and know what we’re talking about. [] I love Egypt, I really do. I consider myself patriotic, and I feel this is a great opportunity for me to do a good thing for my country.”

An Acquired Taste

Launched on October 22, EKT received over 500 unique visitors on their first day and peaked at 1,500. EKT currently averages 800 to 1,000 visitors a day. The site seems to be finding its audience. According to the site’s visitor tracking program, 95 percent of the visitors are from Egypt and each spend an average of five minutes on the site. EKT has over 200 Twitter followers and their page on Facebook, which is responsible for an estimated 90 percent of their traffic, has over 1,000 fans.

“We were stunned by the number on our first day,” says Makarona. “We were afraid this kind of humor only the three of us would find funny, but [it] turns out it really struck a chord with readers. I’ve been writing for five years and never got comments. Now that I write satire, I get half a dozen comments on each article, and people are constantly sending us emails, writing jokes, keeping it alive. They keep telling us something like this was long overdue.”

EKT is written only in English, as none of the creators feels they have the skill to write Arabic satire. Consequently, readers of the site are a small segment of Egyptians who speak fluent English, and, given the responses from the social networking sites, are in the age bracket of 18-35.

Pasha believes that the limited reach is ok for now, “since satire is smart humor and you have to be educated to get it. However [this means you’re] reaching a very small part of the population and to have real change, you need it to reach everyone.”

The Onion’s media kit implies that satire is not likely to reach a mass audience. Its demographic data states that Onion readers are “are young and wealthy, see movies, live music and theater, like to go out and party, are tech-savvy, stay fit and like sports, buy CDs, DVDs and books and continue to learn.”

While that is an attractive market for advertisers, EKT founders say that going corporate is not the goal. The founders all hope to continue working in their real jobs in order to make enough money to sustain EKT without generating revenue. “We won’t be putting ads for TE Data and Mobinil,” says Zeyada. “That would take away from the koshary-ness of the site and it would no longer be purely satirical. But perhaps if we build a big fan base, we could think of merchandising.”

If they do branch out into El-Koshary Today t-shirts and ball caps, you won’t find the founders’ faces or names on the gear. “We don’t want this to be about us,” says Zeyada. “It takes away something from the humor when you know who we are and you categorize us in society.”

But there is another motivation for anonymity. Over the past four years, the government has cracked down on internet activism, detaining high-profile bloggers and Facebook-using protest organizers.

“You really don’t know what could happen,” says Makarona. “People get arrested for the most trivial things and not for the most serious things. We talk about things like the inheritance of power.”

The possibility of arrest is a hefty price for what is currently just a hobby for the three friends. The EKT team has no long-term plans for the satire news site, but they are currently looking for contributors who can help them put out articles on a daily basis. “Egypt is such an easy target to satirize,” says Makarona. “We’ll never run out of [material] to write about.”

“If we can start getting sites like this out there it will do a lot to help press and journalism in Egypt,” says Pasha. “EKT are taking the news and turning it on its head. They’re crossing a line into uncharted territory and we’ll see how it will go.”

EKT has already gotten a taste of its own dish. A week after the website went live, a blogger called ‘One Only’ posted a story dated April 1, 2009 (April Fool’s Day in the US), titled “Government Will Stick a Fork in El Koshary Today.” The story claimed, “A new program will be launched to shut down the start-up publication El Koshary Today. [Their] style of sarcasm based on underlying truth apparently does not sit well with everyone.”

“I panicked and thought we were done for,” says Makarona, “but it turns out it was a hoax. However, it could have been true.” et

Photo Credit: Mohamed Allouba
Available at: http://egypttoday.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=8706

In 2050, a fifth of Egyptians will be age 60 and older. How will the country accomodate its aging population?

By: Ethar El-Katatney

Drive down a series of rocky, unpaved streets in Imbaba, passing piles of garbage, packs of stray dogs and rickety tok-toks blasting Arabic pop music, and you’ll eventually come to a weathered, gray building. Out front is a group of shifty-looking young men standing under a faded sign that reads “Dar El-Hana’.”

This is one of Egypt’s 140 door moseneen, or homes for the elderly. Here you will meet Sabah Abd’alsalam, a frail 60-something-year-old widow with sunken eyes who has spent 16 years in the home’s worn confines. Blind and largely abandoned by her family, she a shares small, spartan room with three other women. The broad strokes of her story are, sadly, far from unique.

“My daughter committed suicide when she was 19,” says Abd’alsalam. “I never see any of my sons. One is a rich doctor, but when I had a problem with my eyes he didn’t pay, so I had to go to a cheap doctor and now I am blind.”

Abd’alsalam is one of forty seniors who call Dar El-Hana’ home, and one of thousands of older Egyptians who have been shunned by their families — a testament to the country’s fast-changing social fabric. As nuclear family households become more predominant, experts say a growing number of Egyptians are opting to send their parents to nursing homes. That is just one of several touchy issues, from pension funds to the cost of medicine, facing a country on the verge of a demographic time bomb.

In Egypt, the elderly are the fastest growing segment of the population. In the last two decades, the life expectancy of the average Egyptian has risen 13 years to 71. In December 2008, the Information Decision Support Center, the think tank of the Egyptian cabinet, published the first comprehensive study of the elderly in Egypt. According to the report, in 1986, 5 percent of Egyptians were age 60 and older. In 2015 they’ll make up 11 percent of the population and in 2050, over a fifth.

Getting older, as the United Nations Institute of Aging puts it, “is a privilege and a societal achievement.” However, it presents a massive challenge for both the public and private sectors, which will have to provide everything from wheelchair ramps to affordable healthcare plans. Dr. Ezzat Hegazy, senior researcher at the National Center for Social and Criminological Research, has been studying issues surrounding the elderly for the past 15 years, and written half a dozen books. The Minister of Social Solidarity, Dr. Ali El-Moselhi, has put him in charge of drafting a comprehensive plan that encompasses all the needs of the elderly. (But elderlyegypt.com, the initiative’s official website, has not been updated since 2007.) The biggest obstacle the 64-year-old Hegazy sees to caring for seniors is a lack of public understanding about the issues associated with a graying population.

“In 2050, we will have 24 million people over the age of 60,” he says. “This will affect absolutely everything and we haven’t paid any attention to this phenomenon until recently. It will need a lot or organizing in terms of accommodation, health insurance, pensions, hospitals, homes and much more.”

Happy Homes?

One of the most pressing issues facing the elderly is housing: As the number of seniors increases, the question becomes where will they live? Fifty years ago, when households included large extended families, grandparents, parents, grandchildren and other relatives lived together in one house. Today, fewer Egyptians are opting to live with their parents after marriage.

Dr. Mahmoud Shehata, vice president of The Egyptian Association of Aging, says many seniors want to stay with their families, but as the saying goes, “ma belyad heela” [my hands are tied].

“Two weeks ago a man called me crying because his children can’t stand him and he’s looking for a place to live. [This happened] after he gave his eldest son his apartment. A [seniors’] home will never give him what he wants, and he will never be comfortable away from his family.”

It’s a pain 73-year-old Ateyat Mansour knows well. She has spent 15 years at the Dar Al-Hana’ home. In a pink galabeyya and matching scarf, she says, “The truth is families are not what they used to be. Rather than the grandfather becoming kebeer el-‘ela, the family head, children can’t wait to get rid of their parents, [they] think we are a huge burden.”

Mansour is one of Abd’alsalam’s roommates. Each has a single bed, a small table and a quarter of the closet space. Garlands of artificial flowers and rosary beads hide the cracks in the walls, which used to be bright yellow but are now sallow.

In 1986, there were 29 homes like this in Egypt. Now there are 140 operating under licenses from the Ministry of Social Solidarity. Based mostly in Cairo and Alexandria, they serve 4,000 of Egypt’s 4.4 million elderly, or less than 1 percent. In developed countries, about 6 percent of seniors live in nursing homes. Abroad, these homes are usually compounds with individual units made specifically for the elderly, with facilities such as wheelchair ramps, customized bathrooms and handholds on the wall. But locally there were no such homes accessible to the middle class until 10 years ago. Those that existed were only for those who couldn’t afford to pay anything at all. They were simply “eewa’ [a roof over their heads]” says Hegazy.

Although Dar Al Hana’ isn’t a world-class home by any means, it is cozy, and run by a woman who cares deeply about its residents. Dalia Nageeb, 32, joined Dar Al-Hana’ in 2000 and became the home’s administrator in January 2008. Sitting in her office with threadbare carpets, she calls residents family. During her time with Dar Al-Hana’, she says attitudes towards nursing homes have started to change.

While many seniors are sent away because of family conflicts, others move into homes because they have no immediate relatives “and come because of loneliness,” she says. Some need physical and mental care. And a small minority go because they want to be around others like them.

For those who come unwillingly, Nageeb says, “they feel they are in a prison and so hate the place in the beginning, but then [come to accept it] and even [appreciate] being around people their own age.” Men, she says, are much harder to deal with than women. “The men are used to being in charge of their house, wife and children. So they find it very hard to relinquish control.”

Aly Abdel Hamid, 86, is one of those men. Sitting in a chair in a spotless galabeyya and red scarf, he knits a skullcap in silence. When he talks, he recites poetry: “Oh the soul that wishes to look upon the beloved, but sits here grounded by the body.”

Sitting on the carpeted roof of the six-floor building, the eight men and women gathered around clap for Abdel-Hamid, who goes back to knitting.

“Don’t mind him,” says rosy-cheeked 78-year-old Kamal Hegab with a grin, “He’s just not used to speaking to pretty girls.”

Resting his coffee cup on a table covered with a plastic pharaonic tablecloth, Hamid says, “I’ve been here for seven years. I married off my four daughters and now I don’t have to worry about anyone. We don’t live in a five-star hotel, but we’re all happy together. We pray, we eat, we have a place to sleep. What more could you want from life?”

The Duhr prayer is heard, and everyone gets up to prepare for prayer. While they do so, Nageeb gives me a tour of the building. On the ground floor is a physical therapy clinic with dusty contraptions. The first and second floors are for the female residents, the third is the kitchen, the fourth is for the 15 male residents, and the fifth is for the female attendants who live in the building. Going up to the roof, you can the Nile on a clear day.

Although the home could do with some major renovations — it has only two rusty washing machines and is laced with broken tiles — Nageeb has tried to make it as homey as she can. Qur’anic verses are on the walls, vases of artificial flowers grace every table, and on every floor there’s a small living room where the residents can sit together and talk. Nageeb is most proud of the elevator that was installed five years ago.

As small as the home is, for many of the residents it’s a life better than the one they lived. For LE 110 a month (if they can afford it), they get three square meals a day, a bed and laundry service. Residents spend the time between meals talking on the roof, playing chess or dominoes, watching TV or taking naps. Some days they have lectures or day trips.

“We subsist mainly on donations,” says Nageeb, who receives between LE 36,000 and 48,000 annually from residents.

“[That] doesn’t even cover half the costs [especially medicine, which is expensive]. In 2008, our expenses were LE 92,000 but they’re happy and content, which is all that matters.”

The biggest problem with homes for the elderly, Nageeb says, is finding qualified personnel “If the people who help them somehow make them feel like they are a burden, or belittle them somehow, it’s a disaster. You have to realize that the people here are not working, they’re old, they’re tired, they’re sick, they’re not with their families, they get depressed and they deserve our respect. Imagine if you are in their position [] it can be humiliating when you have to ask a stranger to help you bathe.”

Hotel Home

As their numbers grow, the nature of nursing homes is changing. “The understanding of a home was that it sheltered poor old people,” says Hegazy. “But now you have homes where the residents used to be respected doctors and university professors, [] people who pay good money to stay in a home.”

Although their numbers are very small — Hegazy estimates there are not more than a couple of hundred wealthy nursing home residents — they have more than doubled in the past five years. These nursing homes are private investments and profit-making businesses. “Even the Ministry of Health has one of them in Helwan,” says Hegazy.

One of these homes is Dar Sayedat Masr, located in the middle class neighborhood of Heliopolis, overlooking a garden directly opposite Heliopolis Hospital. A room here costs between LE 2,000–4,000 a month, depending on its size, whether it’s shared and if it has a view or an en-suite bathroom. About 100 residents live there, with 18 rooms on each floor.

Colonel Mohamad Amin has been running this home, which he prefers to call the “Honoring the Elderly Hotel,” since 1996. According to him, people now prefer to live in homes because families aren’t what they used to be— mah’adesh taye’ had [no one tolerates anyone].” He says most seniors are there because their children live abroad, or because their spouse died and they were living alone.

“Even if they’re rich, they can be lonely. Loneliness equals depression. And living alone involves responsibilities like doing the laundry, cooking and cleaning. Here they don’t have to worry about that.”

Running a seniors’ home, says Amin, is expensive. “Think of laundry, maintenance, the air conditioners, the employees, the food, the elevators. We employ at least 50 people. [] The elevator we installed in 2001 cost LE 65,000. Now to install a new one costs LE 150,000.” The cost of food has gone up so much, he says, the home has cut back on serving meat.

Elderly Needs

The conventional wisdom is that most elderly who live with their families are provided with everything they need. But many face mounting health care costs and the burden of supporting their children well into their golden years.

As of June 2008, 84 percent of all seniors had dependents (generally supporting between two and four people, including themselves) with men being more likely to have dependants than women.

“The divorce rate is increasing and a lot of women return to their fathers’ homes with children,” says Hegazy, the researcher. “The catastrophe is that she doesn’t work [] and an even bigger catastrophe is that she usually gets no alimony. So her father has to find the money to support her and her children. Likewise, a lot of men don’t work and remain financially dependent on their fathers well into their mid-thirties, and then also need their help in order to get married.”

As of December 2006, only 16 percent of the elderly worked, and most were men (only 3 percent of elderly women work). This means that for many, the notoriously ineffective pension system (see box), which gives stipends ranging from LE 60–600, is their only source of funds.

Covering the cost of healthcare is another major challenge for seniors. Currently, 62 percent of elderly men have health insurance compared to 35 percent of elderly women. However, medical care for the elderly, in the absence of a comprehensive health insurance plan, is extremely expensive. Few hospitals have wings just for the elderly, two percent of whom have a permanent disability (that’s 81,000 people). There are only 52 physical therapy centers in Egypt serving 1,258 of those over 60.

Clubs and Community

In Egypt, there are very few community clubs or charity organizations that focus solely on helping the elderly. Instead, most cater to orphans or the disabled.

“The problem is that their resources are limited and there is a misperception that the number of elderly is small and that their needs are few,” says Hegazy. And even then, he explains, these services usually only focus on Cairo and Alexandria.

“Lets say there’s a lonely widow in Sa’eed [Upper Egypt]. If she’s lucky, someone will feel sorry for her and provide her with food. Every now and then they’ll go to see her and give her a shower. And that’s if she’s lucky. Is that enough?”

Hand in Hand is a community club at the American University in Cairo that began with the aim of visiting elders in homes twice a month, and hosting two large events for them every year — an iftar and a Mother’s Day party.

“We get them medicine and food,” says Hand in Hand President Mohammad Saeed. “We also have a donations campaign for elders to send them on umra, the lesser pilgrimage. But most importantly, we visit homes that are very bad, where the people aren’t happy and not much attention is paid to them. I don’t think anyone can be happy living in a home, but it’s made worse because they have no form of social entertainment. The quality of the food, the beds and the bathrooms is so bad.”

Unfortunately, says Saeed, membership in the club is low. “The problem is that dealing with the elderly is not like dealing with orphans, who are satisfied with toys and hugs. The elderly need more than that, and it’s hard. Some are happy when we visit them, but some are annoyed, thinking that we are pitying them, so you have to be very good to deal with them.”

Dar Al-Hana’ wal roh, which is not related to the nursing home, is one of the few official charity organizations in Egypt that serves the elderly, though it also helps orphans and the disabled. It opened its doors in 1996, and today helps 1,500 people every year.

Sitting in her office with faded stickers of Mickey Mouse on the wall and a large crack in the ceiling, Aisha Ezzeldin talks about the organization which is based in a tiny four-room apartment in Haday’e El-Oba, an impoverished area in Cairo.

“For the elderly we take them on trips, and we have lectures for them — about religion, families, health, everything. Around 300 men and women attend, but most don’t pay, not even for the trips, because they don’t have money.”

For Zakeya Shehata, 72, dressed in a brown abaya with jaundiced eyes, the center was a lifeline.

“My 50-year-old son lives abroad so I live alone,” she says. “I used to feel that if I died, no one would find out until they came to see what the smell was. [] When we get old, we need to sit with people like us. It makes me happy to come here. [] We need to talk, it’s just as important as food and drink.”

Talking, says Hegazy, is an often-ignored need that is not considered when thinking of the elderly. “They also have psychological needs, one of the biggest being what to do with their days. They need entertainment and ways to feel useful.”

The Egyptian Association of Aging (egypt-aging.org), which is the largest association for the elderly and was founded by the Ministry of Social Solidarity in 2003, organizes activities for the elderly, from sports to pilgrimages. But out of 4.4 million people over the age of 60, only 8,000 are members.

In addition, there are currently 190 clubs for the elderly in Egypt with approximately 40,000 members. For a nominal membership fee, around LE 10 per year, they have access to an activity center, a library, a physical therapy center, and can take courses to learn skills such as sewing.

For those over 60, the government also offers special discounts on local transportation and flights and on entry tickets for theaters, cinemas, clubs and fairs, although it is unknown how many people actually make use of these services.

Taking Care

Building homes that take care of elderly people’s physical and psychological well-being is only the first step in helping Egyptian society deal with the forthcoming demographic evolution.

Hegazy and his team have been working on a national framework that brings together the Ministry of Social Solidarity, the Ministry of Health and Population, and the Ministry of Insurance and Social affairs to create a bill of rights for the elderly.

The program has two main aims: To streamline existing laws related to the elderly (such as the arduous process of licensing a nursing home) and to develop new initiatives, like a helpline.

“So many old people are living alone and a helpline will be there for them if they encounter any problem,” says Hegazy, “whether it’s finding someone to help them fix a burst pipe or advice on how to deal with their blood pressure.”

Renovating and building geriatric health care centers as well as physical therapy clinics just for the elderly are in the works. In 2008, the UN Institute of Aging launched training programs at the Geriatric Unit of Ain Shams University for Egyptians working in the field of aging.

The UN Institute of Aging says that any plan to deal with the elderly must encompass health, housing, entertainment, income, work and education. Advocates hope this is what Hegazy’s plan will do.

“Old age is not a disease; it’s a stage of life,” says Hegazy. “The elderly are not parasites. They have given some 40 years of their lives to the country. They have fulfilled their role as producers and employees and spouses and parents and grandparents. It’s time for us to give back to them. Their care is not aid—it’s a right. [] You must all remember that you will be old one day.” et

Pension Plight

Aperson used to die before he retired or soon after, so the government didn’t worry about pensions,” says Dr. Ezzat Hegazy, senior researcher at the National Center for Social and Criminological Research. “And even if I’m being very considerate, the truth is that the elderly are mostly consumers and not producers. So, where are they going to get the money to accommodate their needs?”

Theoretically, they should get their money from the government pension fund, collected from them while they were younger under Law 70 of 1975. Hegazy puts the amount the government collected at LE 300 billion, while Dr. Shokry Azer, president of the People’s Committee to Protect the Insurance and Pensions Fund, puts it at LE 362 billion.

Regardless of the figure, there is legitimate worry that the government has included the amount in the treasury of the Ministry of Finance, which Azer says is “ridiculous and unconstitutional.” The Committee has raised a case to the State Council and Supreme Constitutional Court, demanding that an independent body monitor the LE 362 billion.

And along with the Protection for Pensioners group, Azer is also working against the new Social Insurance Act, which will be discussed in the next People’s Assembly session. The new act, which Azer says will be a “travesty” if allowed to pass, aims to privatize the social security and health insurance systems, which he says will not be in the best interests of “pensioners, orphans and widows.”

Currently, Ministerial decree 1140 of 2006 says a retired man or woman is eligible to take LE 60–80 minimum per month based on number of dependents. Minister of Finance Youssef Botros Ghali announced in late 2009 that more than 50 percent of pensioners take LE 500 per month, claims which were shot down by many.

According to Azer, “out of 4 million Egyptians over the age of 60 eligible for pensions, almost none get more than LE 300, and 1.35 million get less than LE 150, which means they take less than $1 per day, below the poverty line.”

That LE 150 per month though, has Egyptians aged 60 and above standing in line for hours (often in the sun) and visiting a dizzying number of offices to collect their paltry sum.

Hegazy also points out that the new increases for pensions discriminate between those who worked for the government and those who didn’t. Still, for many it is a lifesaver.

“If it wasn’t for my pension, I would have starved in the street,” says 68-year-old Nafeesa Samy. “I was married for nine years when I was 20 and then my husband, who worked in a government office, died and left me with two young sons. I received a LE 300 pension and saw that it was very good so also decided to work at a government office. And when I retired I got a pension of LE 300 too, which gives me LE 600 a month. My 32-year-old son is unemployed and unmarried and still lives with me, so LE 600 is great.”

But not everyone is as lucky as Samy. 70-year-old Khadija Ahmed, who suffered second-degree burns on her arms and face when she was 12, has eight children, all girls. In 1979, her husband died, and she stepped into the kiosk in his place.

“I stopped working when I couldn’t do it anymore,” she says. “I receive no pension at all. I am renting out the kiosk, because otherwise my girls who still live with me wouldn’t be able to live.”

Photo Credit: Mohamed Allouba

 No start-up capital, no rent, no taxes, no licenses and instant access to your customers. No longer just a dream.

By: Ethar El-Katatney

Twenty-two year old Yasmine Medhat made a gross profit of LE 28,000 and a net profit of LE 6,000 in one day. It took her 20 minutes to set up her business, and she made her first sale within an hour of opening. She began two months ago with no start up capital, pays no rent, electricity or taxes, has no employees, stores no inventory and has no fixed costs. Over 1,000 people now know about her business and yet she hasn’t spent a single piaster on advertising.

Welcome to the new way of doing business: Facebook.

Originally a social networking site, Facebook has evolved into something hard to define. In Egypt, the site has been used as an enormously successful matchmaker, protest-organizer, and now a business platform.

Finding their efforts blocked by the red tape, bureaucratic obstacles, lack of finance and numerous costs and regulations involved in starting a business in Egypt, it is a platform to which fledging entrepreneurs are turning.

With around 10% of the 12.57 million Egyptians online using Facebook — over 1.2 million according to the company — these entrepreneurs may just be onto something.

The Businesses

Facebook is based around user-created web pages and groups: simple, one-page universal templates that include a section for recent news, comments, discussion threads, photos, videos, links and events, along with a public description and picture for the group. Originally used for discussions or fans interested in a topic, the concept quickly evolved into a suave marketing tool for businesses. Then the groups evolved one step further, into actual businesses.

The premise seems ridiculously simple, almost too good to be true: Set up a group, think of a name and a logo, write a one paragraph summary of what you’re selling and how customers can order and pay for it. Upload photos and descriptions of the products. Invite all your friends to join the group, and watch as the clients roll in. It sounds easy, but it works.

Medhat is a recent graduate of the American University in Cairo and mother of a one-year-old son. She has no business experience and did not study business. On a trip to the United States, she realized that brand name designer scarves — used as hijabs by a certain segment of Egyptian women–were sold in outlets at much cheaper prices than at the actual stores. So when she got back to Egypt, she browsed the internet and contacted a number of suppliers who told her they could ship the scarves to her in Egypt. They sent her photos of their current inventory, so she immediately set up a group on Facebook, uploaded the photos, and invited all her friends to join. Twenty minutes later, she’d made her first sale and Echarpé was born.

Two months later, Medhat is a smashing success. Her Facebook group has over 1,000 members, and she sells around 20 designers scarves a week for LE 600-1,000 each, complete with her own self-designed logo that she sticks on the packaging. She collects a 50% cash deposit from customers before ordering the scarves — she pays her suppliers via Western Union — and the other 50% on delivery. Once a fortnight she orders from suppliers and puts a new collection of photos online.

Medhat can sell scarves cheaper than her few local competitors, as she has no fixed costs. She has now branched out into selling original, second hand and replica scarves, with profit margins of 20%, 40%, and 60% respectively.

“I’m lucky that I’ve found such a niche,” says Medhat. “I sell a product for a lot cheaper than my competitors in Egypt. I pay very little for customs — perhaps LE 250 for 80 scarves since they are so light and the customs [officers] don’t really know their value. The people on Facebook can afford to buy designer scarves, and if they don’t like the product once it’s here I can always resell it easily.”

Not just suits and ties

Medhat’s story is just one among hundreds. Facebook currently has 214 groups listed as ‘Businesses-Home Business’ in the Egypt network, although that is not necessarily an accurate measure, as not all businesses list themselves or even that they are located in Egypt.

There are three types of people who use Facebook for businesses. The first type are those with already established ‘brick and mortar’ businesses, who are using the online group as a way to raise awareness of and market their products, becoming ‘brick and click’ businesses. One such business is Tarkhan Gallery, a 15-year-old furniture gallery in Mohandesin previously known as Gallery Gharieb.

“My son pushed me to set up a group,” says owner Iman Tarkhan. “I never thought that I would get customers from it but I did and my furniture isn’t cheap — an average sofa goes for LE 10,000. I was showing my furniture at the exhibit at the Baron Palace in May and some people came who said they knew about me just from Facebook.”

The second type of people are those who have a website or a catalogue but no store and use Facebook as an additional selling or marketing tool. With LE 50, 27-year-old Abeer Selim and a couple of her friends began Art & Crafts in 2004, selling handmade cards and guestbooks. An architect by training, Selim is an editor at a real estate magazine. Initially, she and her friends started selling their goods to friends and through booths at events like concerts and other large gatherings. They soon cottoned on to the idea of selling products through Facebook.

Although the Facebook group Art & Crafts only has around 500 members so far, its creators have already branched out into designing wedding invitations, guestbooks, and decorations. They have become so successful with their customer base someone actually stole the logo they designed and set up another group with the same name, aiming to capitalize on their success. Selim reported them to Facebook, and the other group was shut down.

“Before Facebook we had to go to events, renting out a stall, and produce flyers. That cost a lot and it was only for one day. But with this group clients can find us any time without costing us anything. It’s amazing,” says Selim.

The last type of Facebook business is the entrepreneur like Medhat, those who have realized the massive potential of Facebook as a sole business platform. Some of these Facebook-only businesses have 50 members. Others have 5,000. But in terms of what they sell, they usually fall into two categories: selling handmade products, or importing goods. The handmade products can be as simple as computer designed cards or as intricate as hand sown and personalized baby blankets. Those who import goods either import one type of product such as replica handbags, or serve as ‘middlemen’, uploading photos of products (usually clothes), taking orders, and then delivering them.

Niche products

A quick browse of groups of Facebook’s Egypt network shows that the businesses are either importing products not easily available in Egypt, or selling handmade products targeted to a certain market.

Take for example 24-year-old Fadwa Attia’s painted T-shirts. Attia’s graduation project in 2006 involved painting, and she decided on a whim to paint some designs on T-shirts for herself, drawing inspiration from Egyptian culture. So many people asked her where she bought her T-shirts from that she decided to make and sell some. For a whole year, she would paint designs on T-shirts — which typically takes her a couple of hours per T-shirt — and sell them in booths at events. She was moderately successful, but outside of events she would only get two or three orders a month.

In September 2007, Attia set up a Facebook group for her friends. It instantly took off. Within a month she had over 1,000 members and more orders than she could possibly fulfill. Within six months, she had quit her job to focus solely on her new business, which she branded Fofo, complete with a caricature of herself. Today, her group has over 5,000 members, and she paints not only on T-shirts but on bags, sweatshirts, tank tops and sweaters.

“I could never have done what I’ve done without Facebook,” she says. “It’s truly incredible. The minute I upload new designs people find out about them. I get 15-20 orders a week now and I can’t keep up. People like my designs, and I make enough money to live on quite comfortably.”

The Price advantage

“Effective pricing is reducing the ability of the customer to compare prices and that’s why unique products are important,” says Dr. Ahmed Taher, CEO of marketing consultancy Solutions Consulting. “If they’re not widely available you can charge high margins and no one can compare.”

But if your product is not as unique as one of Attia’s hand painted T-shirts, selling it cheaply can be a way to gain customers, and that seems to be one of Facebook businesses’ main advantages.

Smuggling goods from abroad has always been big business in Egypt. A decade ago people would sneak suitcases full of clothes in random sizes and styles into Egypt from abroad, avoiding paying custom duties by saying the clothes were theirs. Word of mouth and furtive text messages would ensure people would find out about the ‘selection.’ But the range was limited; essentially what you saw was what you got.

The introduction of catalogues gave customers a different way of ordering goods from abroad, but at exorbitant prices. Facebook, on the other hand has changed the system completely. Now customers can see what they want through a group, order it, and have it shipped to their doors — for a lower price than in the local market.

Hany Serry and Nancy Kamel have used Facebook to completely update the way they do business. Thirty-year-old Serry is a consultant for textile companies. Through his job, he has contact with suppliers abroad who buy clothes from outlets and during clearances — and therefore are a lot cheaper than normal.

“I realized that people were selling imported clothes a lot more successfully through Facebook,” says Serry. “I used to get the stock and have open days in my house, but there’s only so much time you can dedicate to it, and [your house] has to be like a storehouse. People are also sometimes wary of going to the home of someone they don’t know — especially women.”

So in September 20008 he started a Facebook group. With a two-line description and two mobile number contacts for Kamel and himself, the group, The Most Fashionable Original Clothes are in Cairo Now, now has over 5,000 members. They receive 8-10 orders per week, with people choosing from the photos he uploads.

“Facebook is free,” says Serry. “My profit margin is 60-70% and even then my prices are only 25% of the prices the clothes are sold for in Egypt. Some items are 400% cheaper. And even though in the past couple of years a [multitude] of clothing stores have opened, I can buy something for LE 100 and sell it for LE 150 while it’s sold for LE 200 in the store,” he says.

“I can only do this because I have no store. A store would bring in people from the street but the items would be more expensive. I don’t pay customs, no one does. I remove the tags of clothes and sew them on when they get here. My shipments are never more than 2-3 suitcases so they’re never stopped.”

Serry and Kamel’s group is only one of dozens upon dozens, who illegally import everything from baby clothes and swimsuits to shoes and hair-straightening products.

Shady Adel and Marvy Hany, both pharmaceutical students, set up their group, Marvelous Beauty: Fabulous Fashion Factory, in December 2008. Adel’s father owns a pharmacy, and soon Adel realized that makeup was one of the biggest sellers. So he got in touch with an importer who smuggles in makeup and presto, the group was born.

“Because we don’t pay taxes or rent, we can price our products a lot cheaper than the market,” says Adel. “The makeup — though most is branded, like Christian Dior — is at least three or four times cheaper than the market price.”

Beginning with a shared start-up capital of LE 1,500, today the group has almost 2,000 members, and Adel and Hany receive between 12-18 orders a week. They deliver products all over Cairo for a fee of LE 10, and make a 20-60% profit on their sales.

A Promoter’s Dream

Promotion wise Facebook is a dream come true — free, immediate access to a network that is always connected and has money to spend: according to a recent MCIT report, 51.8% of households that make more than LE 8,000 per month have computers, and 20.34% of them use the internet.

“It’s like having a store in the most successful mall which people visit every day,” says Taher. “People don’t even go to Citystars every day — but they do go on Facebook at least once a day.”

A group owner starts their client list by inviting their online friends, who can easily number 500 or more. When one person joins a group, his or her friends are notified, and they may be interested. A group that sells similar products to that of another group will list that group in a section titled ‘related groups,’ thereby increasing the circle.

Within a couple of days a Facebook business owner could have a couple of hundred people not only aware of his or her group, but also interested in buying the products. And unlike a website which must be visited to find out about new products or updates, Facebook group members are instantly notified when a group is edited in any way.

Even people who don’t sell their products solely through Facebook find it an incredibly useful marketing tool, primarily because of access to potential clients.

Rasha Rashad is the owner of Zakhareef, a store that sells oriental themed home accessories and makes custom made home furniture like couches, curtains, and tables.

Rashad started selling candles to stores in 2003, and eventually opened her own store. She joined Facebook in 2008 for the sole purpose of marketing her store.

“As a small business I have very little budget for marketing,” says Rashad, “and Zakhareef is a project that is highly reliable on personal contacts — either to know new people who work in handmade products, or clients who want to buy a personal item or learn a craft as a hobby. So Facebook seemed like a perfect media. I have quite a large personal network and I was sure that most people in that network have a large network on their own [who] I sensed would be interested in Zakhareef’s services and products. It was quite difficult to reach people in my network and their network relying on a mailing list for the obvious maintenance and spam problems. Facebook structure solves this problem instantly without any effort from my side, which is great!”

The Unlicensed Web

More and more Egyptians, attracted by lower prices and the convenience of online shopping are buying products through Facebook businesses. But this begs the question: How is it possible for a customer to trust an unlicensed, unregistered business with no physical location their money, when Egyptians at the best of times are wary of online transactions?

The key concern is addressed by the fact no transactions are made online: all business is done in cash, either face-to-face or thought bank transfers. This also means the Facebook business owner is a lot closer — even instantly available by phone — to their clients than many other faceless brands or multinational chains. “The client on Facebook has a voice, and the producer has a face,” explains Taher. “This means a Facebook business can be perceived to be more trustworthy than a real, licensed, online store since you know them.”

Secondly, it is incredibly easy for a customer to find out what people thought of a product and seller — and this will have more weight if a friend has referred you to the group — by simply reading the comments on the seller’s page: happy customers and disgruntled customers alike will write.

Facebook business owners are also often more flexible in returning or exchanging goods if the customer isn’t satisfied, especially if they can be resold easily. Generally, the relationship between seller and consumer is more of an intimate, one-to-one relationship — in essence combining an old-world relationship of trust with the modern media of the internet — something today’s big business struggles to do.

There’s no doubt that Facebook businesses are making good money. But where exactly do these unlicensed, unregulated, unregistered, untaxed and unwatched businesses fall from the government’s perspective? The most probable answer would be e-commerce, which, covering all buying and selling over the internet, is still very much uncharted water in Egypt. (See sidebar).

A lack of legal framework for web activity and the government’s lackluster efforts at promoting and facilitating e-business has provided Facebook business owners with ultimate freedom. None of the Facebook business owners interviewed seemed overly concerned that they might be fined for smuggling in goods or selling them without a license. Very few keep accounting records. Even fewer have taken the time to register their brand names.

It’s true that selling solely on Facebook does pose some difficulties: a Facebook business owner will miss out on potential clients who are not on Facebook and those who still want to see a tangible product. He or she may get orders from phony clients. And if the mentality of Egyptians towards using credit cards online changes, then ‘middlemen’ shoppers may become obsolete.

The businesses profiled here are only the tip of the iceberg. Through Facebook, customers can now order Tupperware, makeup, candles, food, clothes, Indian pashminas, cards, baby gifts, jewelry, accessories, home furnishings and much, much more. The Facebook business economy is changing constantly with every passing day. Groups are forging partnerships, offering discounts if you buy from their partner groups, merging into larger groups, and getting bigger by the day.

Competition will increase — when it’s so easy to set up a group, what’s to stop someone else from setting up a group identical to another, and perhaps even using the same suppliers? As Egypt gets more technologically savvy, it’s hard to predict what the e-landscape will look like in a couple of years. Only time will tell, and with the government laying low for now, the sky is the limit. bt

E-Commerce in Egypt

According to a recent MCIT report, only 0.44% of Egyptian internet users use the internet for e-commerce. That’s a tiny percentage, but it’s still equivalent to over 55,000 people — a not negligible amount. The figure does not include Facebook businesses and any other untracked form of doing business online.

But e-commerce in Egypt has been on the backburner for a number of years, despite the potential for making money on the internet. In 2007, The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) ranked Egypt as number 58 out of 69 countries in terms of e-readiness rankings, where they evaluated a country’s e-business environment and how amenable a market is to internet-based opportunities.”

In order of importance the six criteria used to rank the countries were: “consumer and business adoption; connectivity and technology infrastructure; business environment, social and cultural environment, government policy and vision; and legal and policy environment.”

Egypt’s e-readiness score was 4.26/10, which was worse than its score and rank in 2006, where it scored 4.30/10 and was ranked number 55. In Egypt, the government’s activities toward helping e-commerce grow are limited to supporting infrastructure like e-payment and e-signatures.

Consumer mistrust of online transactions and a lack of legal clarity surrounding e-commerce are two of the reasons Egyptians are not enthused about buying online.

“Although Egyptian credit-card holders are gradually becoming used to using their credit cards on international sites such as Amazon.com,” states the EIU report, “they are still wary of using their credit cards on domestic sites.”

The MCIT report reveals that in 2008, 71.4% of Egyptians were ignorant about e-commerce, while 20.9% simply refused to use online transactions– up from 10.1% in 2007.

In 2004, the much publicized and hyped e-signature law was issued, going into effect a year later in May 2005 with Ministerial Decree 109.

Unfortunately, the law — which involved the creation of the Information Technology Industry Development Authority (ITIDA) under the MCIT — has produced little else of substance.

“The law and its executive regulations provide legal standing for electronic signatures with the aim of stimulating e-commerce growth by providing an amenable regulatory environment,” states the EIU report.

One of ITIDA’s roles, according to Abdel Rahman El-Mawawi, media researcher at ITIDA, is licensing a limited number of certificate service providers in Egypt, in order to provide e-signature services, issue digital certificates and corresponding electronic signatures for citizens and private sector companies’ clients.” In the five years since the law was issued, four companies are still in the process of being licensed.

The law focuses on e-signatures, and doesn’t pay much attention to the broader concept of e-commerce, which it does not even define. Neither does it specify legal protections for e-commerce brands or marketing concepts, though it does imply that ITIDA should promote and regulate e-commerce.

Article 5 of the law does, however, stipulate that a duty at the rate of 1% from the revenues of services and businesses extended by the establishments working in the field of communication and IT shall be imposed on and undertaken by these establishments in favor of [ITIDA].”

Under this article, e-commerce activities should supposedly be paying 1% of all revenues. However, this has never been enforced.

Why is e-commerce so neglected? The answer is simple: the market is still too small and that the government has bigger fish to fry.

“The legislators and regulatory authorities have more than their fare share of problems,” says Dr. Ahmed Taher, CEO of marketing consultancy Solutions Consulting, “and e-commerce is the least of their worries since the volume of business is very minimal relative to all of society. […] Plus, it’s not only difficult but requires knowledge of technology and we all know that the calibers of people who are in authority are lowest when it comes to technology.”

The Egyptian Center for Intellectual Property and Information Technology (ECIPIT), which operates under the umbrella of the MCIT, trained 1,000 students in 2008 in programming. Ahmed Abdel Khaleq, who is in charge of the e-business program, says the course is offered to teach young programmers who work in companies that use e-commerce.

“E-commerce is Egypt is still not an issue,” says Abdel-Khaleq, “because of the mentality of the Egyptian who likes money to be in his hand and given to the seller in front of his eyes, hand to hand. E-commerce needs security, which costs a lot and so a company needs to have enough customers to justify the expense. Demand is not high enough yet and that’s because Egyptians have still not warmed up to the idea of e-commerce.”

“E-commerce in Egypt is in its infancy,” agrees Wael Amin, President of IT services firm ITWorx. “It’s best not to encumber it with legislation, because with fast changing [industries] like technology it will limit creativity and innovation. This industry is deregulated by design and the wisdom of doing so is clear. [With these] infant industries we must leave them to their own devices because if we try to regulate them and hold their wings, we will break them.”

“People in Egypt are developing their own business models to take advantage of e-commerce. The tried and tested business e-commerce models in the West like Amazon.com are not very transportable to the Middle East because of the difference in e-maturity and e-awareness and e-security and the much lower penetration rates of computers and credit cards and e-payment methods. So entrepreneurs and companies are finding their own space in developing e-commerce. Facebook is one example,” says Amin.

Available at: http://businesstodayegypt.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=8510
Photo Credit: Ryan Luikens

The food industry has been spoiled by loose food safety regulations and disorganized enforcement, but producers will soon have to clean up their acts to comply with international standards.

By: Ethar El-Katatney and Lindsey Parietti

The fortitude of the Egyptian stomach is a source of both pride and humor. Years of digesting treats such as feseekh (salted, aged fish) and the fragrant gibna baeda qadeema (old white cheese) — delicacies that would send those of weaker constitutions running for the bathroom — have produced digestive systems more resilient to local bacteria.

But Egyptians’ faith in their stomachs is also one of the many obstacles facing the country as it attempts to clean up a food industry not renowned for hygienic practice. As several ministries collaborate to create a new food safety agency that will be responsible for updating food safety laws — some governing the industry are relics of the 1930s and 40s — food producers, retailers and restaurants will be forced to comply with more stringent international standards following a Ministry of Trade and Industry decree last year.

The shift could be difficult for some business owners who believe they are already taking appropriate food safety measures.

Samy Ahmed, 27, runs a Kebda cart in downtown Cairo that he inherited from his father. “Everyone loves the sandwiches. I wash my hands in the morning, and my ingredients are very fresh. Egyptians have very good seha [health]— no one gets sick from food!”

Standing in his kiosk in Mohandiseen surrounded by dusty boxes, Mohamad Sayed, 33, shares his idea of proper food safety: “Of course I don’t sellanything here that is bad. I’m an honest man — ­whenever anything is past its expiration date, I sell it for half price.”

Consumers have the choice to avoid the particularly dirty corner mart or offending fuul cart, but the bigger problem lurks in the behind-the-scenes practices of large food producers and distributors.

In April 2008, following a flurry of unfavorable media coverage, the Ministry of Health and Population launched mass food safety inspections in 13 governorates. At one dairy company the ministry discovered rat poison stored next to cheese-producing machines, according to local daily Al-Akhbar, which was present for some of the inspections. A soda company in Beni Sueif was using water from an unlicensed, contaminated well to make its products. Soda bottles were found with insects and metal objects inside them. In a tobacco company in Giza, the storage area was infested with insects and spiders and exposed electricity cables lined the walls. In the same company’s Alexandria branch the situation was worse: Leftover materials from the production process were used to create new products.

Following 456 inspections and a host of appalling health violations, the Health Ministry closed 96 factories, hotels, restaurants and storage areas and filed police reports against many of the offenders. The Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) also issued a decree (Decree no. 757 of 2008) requiring all food producers to comply with local standards by the end of 2009, and to comply with international Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) or International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 22000 guidelines — both international quality standards (see box on page 79) — by the end of 2010.

Despite the fact that these international standards have become routine procedure for food producers, suppliers and restaurants around the globe, many local businesses don’t see why they are necessary, says Dr. Ahmed Karam Ammar, a trainer for agricultural and food management consultants GMB-Precon.

This mentality is one that will have to change if local companies are to truly understand food safety, and not just follow regulations to avoid fines or other penalties, Ammar believes.

GMB-Precon is one of several dozen companies approved by the MTI to help food producers comply with HACCP or ISO standards. The MTI has set up a fund administered by the Industrial Modernization Center, an agency that supports industrial development, and funded by the European Commission to help businesses pay the consultant fees.

The local standards that producers must comply with by the end of this year are more related to the maximum amount of heavy metals and other composition parameters rather than standards that regulate the food production process itself, says Ammar.

“From my perspective these kind of Egyptian standards, they are respected, but the problem is more with the general hygiene,” says Ammar, who thinks meeting international hygiene standards will be the bottleneck for improving food safety practices.

What remains unclear, even to those reforming the industry and drafting a new food safety law, is how the MTI decree will be enforced and by whom.

Although he was uncertain, Hesham Ragab, MTI legal advisor, says the ministry will likely start by enforcing whatever regulations win legislative approval on large and medium-sized businesses.

“Usually Minister [Rachid Mohamed] Rachid’s approach in this area as far as those institutions that are doing their best and putting the right resources [forth] to meet these standards, is if there is a problem [...] or any justification that there be a kind of acceptable delay, these deadlines could be extended. If the delay is because there is no cooperation from those industries and they are just ignoring the minister’s decree, at this point there could be penalties starting from [a reprimand] or notification up to shutting down the facility.”

Last year the MTI also ordered the creation of an independent food safety agency charged with writing a unified food safety law and taking over all food safety activities from the multitude of ministries and divisions that currently oversee this fractured system. But halfway through 2009, the agency has yet to be formed. According to Dr. Hussein Mansour, who was appointed head of the agency, a steering committee made up of members from various ministries and other stakeholders is working to get final approval for the agency’s creation through the People’s Assembly and the Shura Council and wants to begin drafting the new comprehensive food safety law, which will supercede existing laws, as quickly as possible.

The Offenders

According to the General Administration for Food Inspection (GAFI), an agency under the Health Ministry, its 5,246 food inspectors performed 1.7 million inspections in the first half of last year. They found that of the nearly 300,000 food samples taken, about 8,000, or 2.9%, did not meet the agency’s standards. The substandard samples resulted in the disposal of more than 1 million tons of food and 47,000 court cases charging companies with fraud and violation of consumer protection laws.

Although Ammar says the international guidelines, especially ISO, emphasize a “farm to fork” approach to food safety that does not focus on any one part of the food supply chain, the biggest area of concern in Egypt is the production phase.

“I think the food processing itself is very dangerous because you have a lot, a lot of activity between human and between the product,” he says, emphasizing that many products may then go on to other producers or to restaurants for further cooking, where contamination could spread.

Corruption in the licensing and inspection system also accounts for a small part of the problem, as businesses can buy their licenses or be tipped off to inspections, says Ammar.

GAFI Director Dr. Mohamed Sayed, however, believes the biggest problem lies with unlicensed companies that operate outside of the government’s purview.

“Licensed companies’ problems are [usually] due to performance,” he says. “If they make mistakes I can follow them and judge them and even shut them down. But if you work under the table, or are a seller in the street who moves around, of course you’re not interested in food safety.”

Considering Egyptian consumers spend 50%–55% of their income on food and beverages, says Sayed, it’s not that they don’t care, but that they simply don’t know.

Sayed also points out that local companies, which far outnumber hypermarkets and brand chains, typically don’t export their products and therefore don’t focus as much on food safety as those that do.

“You’ll find in some supermarkets that some people have meat in the Pepsi freezer,” says Tarek Saleh, quality director of the family owned Ragab & Sons discount store chain. “I go out to do surveys on my competitors and I’ve seen this: I’ve seen fish cleaned with Persil! [...] Knives washed with Rapso and vinegar, which affects your kidney and liver! And that’s only the tip of the iceberg.”

Lack of public awareness, Saleh believes, is the primary reason behind any retailer’s lack of interest in food safety.

“Will you know if cheese is natural or powdered milk, or off or clean?” asks Saleh. “If your fish is grown in a farm or comes from the sea? If the workers are wearing normal or latex gloves?”

Fines are not enough motivation to make companies clean up their acts, believes Saleh.

“If I have sales of several million per day, a fine of LE 1,000 is nothing,” he says, “but if I know the public will find out I give them food unfit for consumption, the owners won’t be able to sleep at night.”

Ammar says fundamental change has to come from the businesses’ internal culture and workers should be trained not just in the basics of food safety, but in the reasons behind them.

“Food processing companies, restaurants and supermarkets should really cooperate and do their best to comply [...] but not only to obtain the certificates,” says Ammar. “Because there is a big difference between a company that wants a certificate to hang like this on the wall and a company that wants to really work according to the certificates.”

The Big Fish

The international restaurant, retail and hotel chains — along with the local branches of multinational food producers — that permeate Egypt are pulling food safety standards up, says Ammar, who recently assisted the local branch of Aquafina, a division of PepsiCo International, in obtaining its HACCP certification.

“Food safety in hotels and restaurants has really improved,” says Mirjam van Ijssel, executive director of the Egyptian Chef Association (ECA). The ECA has been providing HACCP training for most of Egypt’s five-star hotels since 1999, with the association’s membership coming largely from those hotels. In recent years however, Ijssel has seen more local restaurants such as Abu Shakra utilizing the ECA’s trainings.

Ijssel believes that supermarkets are the entities that need close monitoring. She echoes Sayed in saying food manufacturing companies that export abide by rigid standards, whereas supermarkets don’t pay as much attention “since the public just says ‘maa’lesh’ and doesn’t complain,” she says.

But some supermarkets say they had self-imposed food safety standards in place even before the government began its efforts to clean up the industry. Ragab & Sons implemented a LE 450,000-per-year food safety department three years ago when it began to expand.

Each of the chain’s 16 branch has its own quality assurance inspectors and any fresh product goes through a number of checks before it reaches the customer. As bloody cow carcasses are being loaded into taxi trunks elsewhere in the city, Saleh explains how one makes it on to Ragab & Sons’ counters.

Before a carcass goes into the receiving area, the store checks the temperature of the delivery vehicle and meat containers, among other things. In the receiving area, the cow is inspected visually for injection marks and for the Ministry of Agriculture stamp that indicates it was slaughtered according to legal standards. Internally, its liver is checked and its pH is tested to detect bacteria.

In the manufacturing stage, the cow is split into parts, again with standards applied, such as the use of knives with plastic handles to prevent bacteria accumulation. Employees who move the carcass to the freezer must wear plastic coats and the freezer has to meet certain criteria. If the meat is to be sold right away, it is placed on clean stainless steel plates and chemical agents are used to clean the viewing refrigerator.

Metro, one of the largest supermarket chains in Egypt with 36 branches, has an almost identical system to Ragab & Sons that costs the chain LE 500,000 annually, proving that discount stores can be just as diligent as major chains if they make food safety part of their business philosophy.

Metro performs monthly audits as well as a daily internal inspection of everything down to the length of staff members’ fingernails and beards.

Quality Assurance Manager Iman Refai says that clients are beginning to demand a higher level of food safety and control: “Our clients are A-class consumers, and they know very well how important quality is.”

As local companies begin competing with larger chains or exporting their goods, they are forced to comply with international standards. But business growth also leaves a greater potential for contamination.

“Actually it also has to do a lot with the culture,” Ammar says of why Egyptian companies lag behind their Western counterparts in terms of best practices.

“They don’t pay enough attention to food safety because we just do things as we saw our mothers doing. The issue is that if you are moving from a microscale to the macroscale, you have to be very very careful because what you can do in your own kitchen, you can never ever do if you are cooking for 1,000 people or whatever the size of production. In this case we are talking about multiplication of any mistake.”

Bad Trade Rap

The food industry is the fifth largest sector in terms of exports and, combined with fourth-ranked agriculture, accounted for LE 14.9 billion of the country’s LE 73.9 billion worth of exports in 2007. Food exports grew more than 34% between 2006 and 2007, and the Food Export Council —­ an organization established by the MTI to act as a think tank and liaison between producers and the ministry — has projected that processed food exports could reach LE 121 billion annually by 2013.

Last year the US turned down several shipments of okra, strawberries, and olives — most because of contamination, and some because of substandard packaging and labeling. The European Union also turned down shipments of peanut butter and sunflower seeds because they were contaminated with Aflatoxin, a toxin produced by certain fungi that can damage the liver.

And it isn’t just foreign countries that are taking issue with local food: A study conducted in September 2008 by the National Institute for Medical Surveillance and Research, found that all 30 honey samples samples tested from producers in 20 governorates were infected with Cloramfenicol, which can cause blood and bone marrow diseases.

Another study by the Veterinary College in Cairo on meat safety revealed that, compared to accepted worldwide meat contamination standards of 100–100,000 microbes per square centimeter, Egypt’s meat averages 216 microbes per square centimeter immediately after being slaughtered, which because of contaminated equipment, surfaces and water can grow up to 66 million microbes per square centimeter by the time it is sold in a butcher’s store, Mansour said at a conference last year, reported by local daily Al-Masry Al-Youm.

MTI’s Ragab says that one of the goals of the new legislation is to improve exports and prevent them from being rejected.

“One of the goals mentioned in the draft law is to develop and monitor the level and standards of producing food products here in Egypt and exporting food products. I think this is one of the landmark important points [...] the new established body hopefully will assume responsibility in this sector,” he says.

Although there is still a lot of work to be done and little time before producers, restaurants and retailers must meet the new regulations, Ammar says that even in a worst-case scenario that would involve major outlays on improved infrastructure, his and other consulting firms could help bring a business up to speed in about a year.

“I think it’s not really a big challenge if everybody is working sensibly to implement this system. The government cannot really give too much time for implementation of these kind of certificates because you are talking about the health of the citizens,” says Ammar.

On the other hand, says Mansour, now that the government has decided to act, it is important to take the time to create a system that really works.

Draft legislation establishing the food safety agency, agree Mansour and Ragab, is unlikely to pass through Parliament before the next session, which begins in October.

“Usually, changing tradition is not easy, changing the system is not easy, changing the people’s beliefs is not easy, there are many misunderstandings about many things,” Mansour says, when asked why it has taken so long to try to create a modern food safety system, despite the fact that the government has recognized the problem and that international food safety standards are widely practiced elsewhere.

“We’re talking science and logic, [...] we have many things which go like ‘inshallah’ and things like that are not well defined. We think in details, because details are very much important,” says Mansour.

The much-needed update to food safety laws may be awhile in the making, and it may not be perfect, but it will at least streamline and clarify the process, says Mansour.

“It will make things safer,” he says. “Not necessarily 100%, but it is going to be safer.” bt

HACCP and ISO

Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) is based on technology and procedures developed in the 1970s to prevent food-borne illnesses in astronaut food. The system involves analyzing hazards, identifying points at which they occur and establishing preventative methods and corrective plans that can be put in place when things do go wrong.

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 22000 is similar to HACCP with additional guidelines including communicating food safety issues to consumers and suppliers and seeking registration or certification of a company’s food safety system by an external organization. The organization that created these regulations sets standards for business, government and society through committees of international experts.

Food Police

Food safety in Egypt does not operate under one umbrella organization. And despite the Ministry of Trade and Industry’s mandate to create a food safety agency that will take over all oversight and enforcement, it will likely be a lengthy transition, says Dr. Hussein Mansour, who will head the future agency.

There are around 17 agencies under six ministries currently carrying out some part of the food safety regulatory process, says Hesham Ragab, legal advisor to the minister of Trade and Industry. For the most part, these agencies work independently and their roles may often conflict. For many food companies, this multi-sectoral approach is as confusing as it is costly.

The Ministry of Health and Population carries out the bulk of the work through the General Administration for Food Inspection (GAFI), which has 29 branches across the country. GAFI operates labs that analyze both natural and processed food imports as well as locally produced food samples. The agency also carries out awareness campaigns, trains food inspectors and punishes food producers who don’t abide by the laws by filing police reports, shutting them down or imposing fines, depending on the severity of the violation, the size of the business and whether it is a repeat offender.

The Ministry of Agriculture is in charge of anything related to veterinary and agricultural products, with a central laboratory to analyze pesticides and test for heavy metal residues in food.

The MTI sets standards through the Egyptian Organization for Standardization and Quality (EOS), and is responsible for food safety legislation. The EOS has four essential requirements relating to health, safety, environmental consistency and misleading trade that must be fulfilled before the issuance of any certification.

The Ministry of Social Solidarity contributes to the process with inspectors and consumer protection agencies, and the ministries of Environmental Affairs and Tourism also play a role.

Photo Credit: Mohamed Shady

The Monumnets of El-Muez Street are getting a makeover.

Available at: http://www.egypttoday.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=8439
By: Ethar El-Katatney

Imams, rabbis and priests all frequently crossed paths in Old Cairo back in the day when mosques and churches and synagogues all inhabited the same districts. In a city that has been home to a number of religions and cultures over the centuries, you’d be hard pressed not to find remnants of each era if you look hard enough.

As Egyptians, we’re all proud of our toorath, our heritage, but few of us take the time to really explore the architectural marvels that are literally on every street corner. The Citadel and the Egyptian Museum are as far as some have gone. Others have delved a bit deeper, pursuing the Fatimid, Mamluk and Ottoman monuments, but few remember that Islamic Cairo is only half of the beauty they can see.

Take a day out of your busy schedule and visit some of the most important Jewish, Muslim and Christian monuments in the city. There’s no better place to start than El-Muez Lideen Allah Street, the historic axis of Fatimid Cairo and a maze of over 30 mosques and monuments that span some 800 years. Stretching from the northern gate of Bab El-Futuh to Bab El-Zuweila on the southern wall, the two-kilometer street is the most important commercial thoroughfare of the old city. A walk down it can take you as little as 20 minutes or as long as a day.

The Supreme Council of Antiquities is in the middle of a LE 80 million project to restore El-Muez Street and the monuments lining it. Some 34 sites have been restored along the section of street running from the Qalaoun Complex to Beit El-Qadi, and the street itself has been turned into a cobblestone pedestrian zone.

Our walk starts at Bab El-Zuweila. Passing through the gate from El-Kheyemia (Tentmaker’s Alley), you find Sultan Al-Moua’yed Sheikh Mosque on your left. A prison once stood on this site, and an incarcerated Al-Moua’yed vowed that if he ever came to power he would tear down the prison and build a mosque in its place. True to his word, he built the mosque in 1420, and today it is one of the city’s biggest, with a minaret that provides a panoramic view of medieval Cairo (LE 2 to climb).

On your right, opposite the mosque, you’ll find the Sabil-Kuttab of Nafisa El-Bayda. Built in 1796, the building houses a public water fountain (sabil) at street level and a Qur’anic school (kuttab) for children on the upper floor. El-Bayda began her life as a slave, but became an intermediary between Napoleon and Ibrahim Bey during the latter’s resistance of the French occupation.

Continue around the corner and next to a small jeweler’s shop you’ll find Hammam El-Sukkareya, a rare eighteenth-century men’s public bath that is still in use.

Further on is the El-Ghoureya area, where the Islamic monuments are a bit scarce for a few blocks. There are no shortage of shops, however, and you’ll have to haggle on the move as you dodge running children and porters pushing laden hand-trolleys.

At the intersection of El-Muez and Al-Azhar streets, you’ll find Al-Ghuri Mosque to your left with Al-Ghuri madrasa (school) and khanqa (mausoleum) to the right. Built by Sultan Qansuh Al-Ghuri in 1505, the square between the two buildings was the site of Cairo’s silk market until the late 1800s. The madrasa-khanqa still hosts artistic and cultural events.

Cross Al-Azhar Street via the pedestrian bridge to explore the area’s spice shops. Here you’ll find an endless array of colorful spices and herbs used for everything from cooking and hair dyes to healing and aroma.

Just past the spice shops is the El-Moski neighborhood, which boasts the madrasa and mosque of Al-Ashraf Barsbay on the corner. Further down, the mosque and sabil-kuttab of Sheikh Mutahhar is on the opposite corner in another area called El-Nahassen (the coppersmiths district).

Taking a right in front of the Qalaoun Complex, you can admire and walk beneath the hanging minaret of Madraset Al-Saleh Ayyub. Here in El-Moski you’ll also come across the Jewish Quarter, Harat Al-Yahud, and it is definitely worth a stop. It was once one of Cairo’s most famous neighborhoods and the center of a thriving Jewish community, home to a dozen synagogues. Today, it has become a run-down commercial district, and only two synagogues are left in the alley: the Maimonides Synagogue and the Haim Kapucci.

Moses Ben Maimon, the most illustrious figure in Judaism in the post-Talmudic era, was Sultan Salah Al-Din Al-Ayoubi’s personal physician and is the namesake for the Maimonides Synagogue where he used to teach religion. Egyptians would come from all over the country to visit the synagogue, spending the night and praying, hoping Maimonides would appear in their dreams and solve their health problems.

Backtrack to El-Muez street, and passing Madraset Qalaoun on the left, you will find yourself in Bein El-Qassrein (between the palaces), the neighborhood that is the namesake of Naguib Mahfouz’s famous novel, Palace Walk. Take a left here to see the great Mosque of Sultan Barquq, built in 1386. Open for public visits, this is one mosque that is a must-see both inside and out.

On your right, you’ll see the beautiful Fatimid-era mosque of Al-Aqmar, built in 1125, the first mosque in Cairo to have a stone façade. Right outside is a market area for metal products and coffee-shop equipment, as well as the mosque and sabil-kuttab of Sulayman Agha Al-Silahdar, built in 1837 and featuring a curious mix of Ottoman and Cairene styles.

The last stop before finally reaching Bab El-Futuh is Al-Hakim bi Amr Allah’s Mosque, built in 1010 and named for the eccentric third Fatimid caliph. The recently restored mosque is impressive, but the caliph is better remembered as the ruler who banned the making of women’s shoes during his reign because he believed it was haram, or divinely prohibited. In its long history, the mosque has been used as Salah Al-Din’s stable, a garrison, a prison for the Crusaders, a fortress for Napoleon, and finally a local school.

You’ve earned a break, so pick up the makings of a great meal at the base of Bab El-Futuh, where there are markets, specializing in a particular product including lemons, onions, garlic and olives.

On the Holy Trail: A tour of Christian sites takes you across the country

From monasteries and churches to pilgrimage sites and artifacts, Egypt is home to some of the most visit-worthy Christian sites in the region. Little wonder, considering the Holy Family trekked across the country, hiding from the wrath of King Herod after the birth of Jesus. St. Mark introduced Christianity to the country in the first century AD, marking the beginning of an era that would last until the seventh century and the arrival of Islam.

If you’re not planning on traveling far, then Old Cairo is the place to go, though most of the ancient churches are not to be found there. The first stop should be El-Mu’allaqa, or the Hanging Church, on Mar Girgis Street, to see the beautiful collection of restored ancient icons and an iconostasis inlaid with ebony and ivory.

Nearby is the Coptic Museum (Tel: +2 (02) 2362-8766, open 10am-5pm) with an impressive collection of manuscripts, icons, crosses, mosaics and the remains of excavations.

A short walk away is the Church of Abu Serga, built on the site of a cave in which the Holy Family is thought to have resided at the end of their stay in Egypt. Make sure to stop by the Church of Saint Mercurius, as well as the Convent of Saint George, where you will find a huge, ornamented door inside the building and a series of catacombs where the legendary dragon-slayer is believed to have been tortured.

Straight ahead is the Ben Ezra Synagogue, Egypt’s oldest, dating back to the ninth century.Past it is the Saint Barbara complex, named after a young girl who is said to have been martyred for trying to convert her father to Christianity. At the church you’ll find a gate that leads to the Greek Orthodox cemetery.

Head over to Al-Khurinfish district in the Zuweila area, located in the Fatimid section of Cairo, to see the ruins of an old monastery, a number of churches and several modern monasteries.

There are dozens of similar churches all around Cairo (touregypt.net is an excellent resource for tracking them all down). But if you want to properly retrace the steps of the Holy Family through Cairo without missing any stops, it’s best to make your way to an agency. South Sinai Egypt (Tel: +2 (02) 2418-7310) specializes in organizing visits to Christian sites within Cairo.

If you have more time, then pack your bags and contact Holy Family Egypt (holyfamilyegypt.com), a tour agency which organizes trips to Christian sites outside the capital, following in the footsteps of the Holy Family’s three-and-a-half year flight.

You begin in Sinai, before traveling through the Delta, down the Nile to Upper Egypt and back. Along the way you will visit the monastery on Mount Dronka just south of Assiut (which hosts an annual Moulid of the Virgin Mary in August), a church on Gabel El-Teir (Bird Mountain) — also known as Gabal Al-Kaf (Mountain of the Palm) — near Minya, and El-Moharreq Monastery near Assiut, where Jesus and his parents stayed six months until an angel appeared to Joseph telling him it was safe to return to Palestine.

Considered the birthplace of Christian monasticism, the mountains along the Red Sea house some of the oldest monasteries in the world: the fourth- and fifth-century monasteries of Saint Anthony and Saint Paul, near Zaafarana. Saint Paul is known as the first Christian hermit and Saint Anthony is credited with founding and spreading monasticism. Saint Anthony’s houses a collection of crosses, manuscripts and impressive wall paintings, and the nearby cave where Saint Anthony lived and died is worth the hike.

Another exciting hike is the trek up Mount Sinai to watch the sunrise from the spot where it is believed the prophet Moses received the Ten Commandments from God. Below, St. Catherine’s Monastery shelters the Burning Bush from the Old Testament, as well as a diverse collection of icons and jeweled crosses.

Sakha, in Kafr El-Sheikh, was one of the many stops of the Holy Family during their flight from Herod’s soldiers. It is well known for the 1984 ‘discovery’ of a stone with Jesus’ footprint, now preserved in a glass case inside the Church of the Holy Virgin.

The Holy Family then passed through Wadi El-Natroun, 100 kilometers northwest of Cairo. Here you’ll find the Monastery of Saint Macarius, where early Christians fled from persecution, the Monastery of El-Baramous, the Monastery of Saint Mary, Saint Yehni Kama’s Monastery and Saint Bishoi’s Monastery, which is the monastic residence of Pope Shenouda III, the patriarch of the Coptic Orthodox Church. To this day, the Coptic pope is still chosen from among the monks of Wadi El-Natroun.  et