Weaving Toward a Better Future

In the remote villages of northern Afghanistan, Connie Duckworth is introducing women to the American marketplace. A year and a half ago, the former Goldman Sachs managing director started a nonprofit to buy traditional carpets from hand-weavers and sell them to U.S. consumers. The idea: to empower women in a war-ravaged country by paying 150% of the going rate while insisting that they learn to read, if they can't already, and put their children--even the girls--in school. The group, called Arzu (www.arzurugs org) which is Dari for hope, received a $480,650 seed grant from the U.S. Agency for International...