When young women first arrive at Elena Roshoshenko's center, they have few skills and even less self-confidence. "They don't believe they'll really get a job," Elena says. Elena is a manager at a Catholic Relief Services partner that helps vulnerable Moldovans learn marketable skills. Women who complete her short training programs find work in places like banks, grocery stores and sewing factories.
One young woman, Marina, had to support her twins alone after her young husband died of pneumonia. The Jobs Plus program showed her how to work with customers, handle money and operate a cash register. Jobs Plus also teaches women how to make a household budget, prioritize and maintain savings. After a paid internship, Marina took a job with one of the project's business partners.
The job doesn't just support her family financially—it keeps Marina and her children, now three and a half years old, together. If she'd gone abroad to work, she says, "I wouldn't have seen my kids much. They might not remember the face of their mother."
In Moldova, the poorest country in Europe, human traffickers prey on desperate job seekers, forcing them into unpaid farm labor, begging or prostitution.
Photo by CRS staff 
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