Stakeholders Validate Document To Enhance Women Entrepreneurship In Nigeria

 

Stakeholders have validated a document promoting gender equality and formalisation through women’s entrepreneurship development in Nigeria.

The project, a brainchild of the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria SMEDAN, is supported by the International Labour Organisation, ILO.

At the workshop held in Abuja on Thursday, The Country Director of the ILO in Nigeria, Ms. Vanessa Phala described entrepreneurship as a driver for economic dynamics saying beyond job creation, entrepreneurs enter the market with new technologies.

Ms. Phala said; “When we say MSMEs in Nigeria are struggling, we lose out on the severity of this on women entrepreneurs. Women and men entrepreneurs can encounter similar challenges in their economic activities; however, women are faced with an additional set of gender-based barriers that limit their access to resources and opportunities.

“Women’s businesses tend to” Smaller and highly concentrated in the informal economy. The recent survey by PWC has it that 41%micro-businessessses in Nigeria are owned by women. Such a number should not be neglected in socio-economic discourses as they are major drivers.

“The National Financial Inclusion Strategy (Revised 2018) developed by CBN, affirmed that with the right support including but not limited to access to financial resources women entrepreneurs will contribute to overall economic growth and development of Nigeria.”

She said that “women entrepreneurs have consistently demonstrated resilience and determination to succeed despite facing numerous constraints, including decent work deficits and a less conducive business and regulatory environment that continues hindering them from formalising and developing their businesses.”

Ms. Phala also noted the efforts of the government and actors in the private sector in coming up with different opportunities to evolve interventions and programmes to support and empower women entrepreneurs.

She said; “The government recently developed the Women Economic Empowerment Policy with Pillar 2 of the policy being on Women Entrepreneurship Development.

“The International Labour Organisation (ILO), working with the government at all levels, has also promoted small enterprise development in Nigeria through various initiatives and projects, including the “Promoting Gender Equality and Formalisation through Women’s Entrepreneurship Development” project in Nigeria.”

The project has supported the Government of Nigeria, through the Small and Medium Enterprise Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN), Social Partners, and other relevant stakeholders, to develop a comprehensive, evidence-based, and action-oriented 3year Roadmap as well as its monitoring framework to drive women’s entrepreneurship development and enterprise formalization in Nigeria,” Ms. Phala explained.

Acting Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Labour and Employment, Mrs. Juliana Adebambo said that the Informal Economy has a high number of women whose participation in that sector is often frequently portrayed as motivated by poverty or ‘involuntary exclusion’ from the formal labour market and concerned with sustaining their families livelihood.

She said that a large number of women in the developing world operate in the informal economy stressing that “this has made formalisation very necessary, especially since it is constantly viewed as being of great benefit to business expansion and success.”

“In Nigeria, the proportion of women involved in Entrepreneurship exceeds that of men. According to the National Gender Policy 2021, while women Entrepreneurs can play critical roles in enhancing a country’s productivity and development, structural inequalities make it difficult for women in Nigeria to excel in this aspect.

“There are lots of interventions, female-focused policies, programmes and initiatives instituted by the Government, Social Partners and Private organisations to support women entrepreneurship development.

“However, the effectiveness of these supports on informal businesses is very minimal which is a challenge as most women owned businesses in Nigeria are informal,” she said.

The Director General of the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria SMEDAN, Mr Wale Fasanya in his address, noted that women entrepreneurs often faced a lot of challenges due to their limited awareness of existing opportunities especially in terms of finance.

Fasanya said the document developed by SMEDAN and other stakeholders and supported by the ILO would ensure that entrepreneur women were properly positioned.

“That is to take advantage of the huge opportunity that exists in the global market place in terms of accessing funding, capitals for their businesses, among others,” he added.

Mrs Mabel Ade, Executive Director, Adinya Arise Foundation and a Development Consultant was a participant at the workshop. She called for enabling environment for women to maximise their potentials.

She also advocated for policies consciously targeted to lift women entrepreneurs from the “low level they are now to a higher level.”

The Roadmap addresses existing constraints and tackles new and emerging obstacles that women entrepreneurs may face in an ever-changing economic landscape.

A multi-faceted approach that involved collaboration between government Ministries, Departments and Agencies, private sector stakeholders, Civil Society organizations, and International Agencies was employed to develop the roadmap.

 

 

Mercy Chukwudiebere