Case in point: CSR in Jordan

CSR in Jordan: Jordan River Foundation

The Jordan River Foundation is a national NGO. Founded by Queen Rania Al Abdallah, it is managed by a board of trustees, which consists of 13 members, one of which is the Director-General. It receives financial support from a number of key donors, including various foundations and international donors, the government, corporations, and individual philanthropists.

Empowerment Projects
The Jordan River Foundation projects are implemented through the Community Empowerment Programme, which aims to empower communities, including the most vulnerable, to participate in creating their own economic opportunities and to improve the quality of their lives through a creative reorganisation of natural, human, and economic resources at a local level.

Furthermore, this programme contributes to increasing economic opportunities in Jordan by creating permanent and temporary employment, by maximising the use of local resources, and by encouraging entrepreneurial initiatives.

One main focus of the community empowerment programme is working in areas identified as pockets of poverty. The idea is to infuse a holistic and comprehensive approach to socio-economic development in various areas of the Kingdom. In Tafileh and Karak in the south of the country, the project aims is to partner with selected community-based organizations (CBOs) to implement income-generating programmes and provide people with job opportunities. This project alone has has reached 1,379 people, of whom 768 are women. Also, through providing some 150 CBOs with revolving loan portfolios, 3,404 people have been able to establish and develop their own small businesses (includes 1,838 women and 960 young people).

Regarding young people and, given the importance of this target group, the JRF has implemented various youth programmes, such as the Youth Career Initiative, Youth Work Jordan, and Shabab Zain. It also supports this group via the comprehensive programmes implemented to instil employability skills among young people, particularly those living in impoverished regions. It has been successful in providing 11,024 young people with employability training, information on how to start a business, and vocational training; it has also provided more than 580 young people with job opportunities and with the chance to open and develop small businesses.