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Awosika, Oputu, others seek structural interventions for female-owned businesses

By Ihesiulo Grace 12 March 2021 19 No comment

Female captains of industries, among others, on Thursday called for long term structural interventions and investments for women-owned businesses, to resuscitate global economies from the impacts of COVID-19 pandemic.

They spoke at the Bank of Industry (BoI) webinar to celebrate the annual International Women’s Day (IWD), positing that such women specific initiatives would spur global socio-economic development.

The webinar, with the theme “Recognising Women’s Leadership in Enhancing Nigeria’s COVID-19 Recovery”, attracted prominent women in the private and public sectors, among others. Mrs Ibukun Awosika, Chairman, First Bank of Nigeria Limited, said the pandemic largely affected businesses in the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) category, a level where women maximally played.

According to Awosika, the capital base of many womenowned businesses had become almost non-existent due to the pandemic.

She, therefore, pushed for greater investments in digital literacy and E-commerce to reintegrate and revitalise the MSME into the business space and increase national productivity.

Awosika stressed the need to build economic clusters for training, standardisation, and other value addition processes of women-owned businesses to meet the volumes that major corporations needed from them.

“Resources for women participation globally have seen lot of changes with more opportunities and specific attempt to include women in processes that would allow socioeconomic development.

“We need longer term structural interventions that would help to sustain businesses, especially, female-owned businesses, to increase national productivity and improve the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) output.

“We must invest in digital literacy and find a way to plug women in E-commerce platforms to enhance the sustainability of these businesses.

“We must also create common platforms and clusters for higher participation, volume and value, as well as provide basic infrastructure for improved production and manufacturing capacity.

“Once these clusters are created, for example, a leather village or a fashion village, there can be direct investment for what is required to upscale in order to become a competitive voice globally in such areas.

“Government as the biggest spenders must also ensure that their procurements are inclusive of these women-owned businesses by up to 45 per cent to encourage other customers and increase turnovers for these businesswomen,” she said.

Also speaking, former Managing Director of BoI, Mrs Evelyn Oputu, tasked government and the BoI on connectivity to capacity building and investment institutions for women-owned business clusters to stimulate the economy.

Oputu also called for the creation of a policy mandating manufacturers to increase utilisation of local raw materials for production by up to 20 per cent to reduce manufacturing dependence on imports.

“We must begin to concentrate on MSMEs which would stimulate economic recovery by focusing on the value chain, and pushing products where we have competitive advantage.

“Afterward, we must create a cluster of these businesses, and provide infrastructure, quality, and assured products taking.

“We must resuscitate the MSME space not just by providing financial support but by creating a cluster concept to build capacity, and improve value chain,” she said.

Mrs Maryam Katagum, Minister for State for Industry, Trade and Investment, said in her contribution that in promoting gender equality, the importance of both genders must be reinforced in schools, places of worship, the business community and society generally.

Katagum stressed that women entrepreneurship was vital to achieving sustainable socio-economic growth and development.

The minister reiterated government’s commitment to supporting the revival of womenowned businesses through its various intervention measures.

She said that the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration was women supportive in the light of the number of women in ministerial and many other core positions in government.

“Mr President recently supported our own Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who has gone to become the Director-General, World Trade Organisation. “His cabinet includes seven women ministers, and others in core positions.

“To advance women entrepreneurship, particularly the MSMEs, government did cash transfers and also made provision of up to 45 per cent for them in the Economic Sustainability Plan.

“We are not stopping there, as there are plans to mobilise resources and funds that would address challenges faced by businesses to engender sustainable development.

“We have a role to play in ensuring gender equality becomes a reality and employ everyone to choose to challenge the status quo by supporting women and showcasing their talents,” she said.

Dr Sarah Alade, Special Adviser on Finance and the Economy to President Buhari, also advocated deepened effort to close the gender gap by challenging the status quo to ensure more women inclusion as the nation begins recovery from the pandemic. Alade sought for expanded access to transformational soft skills upgrade for women to engender a comeback in the business space.

“The United Nations projects that 96 million people, of which 47 million are women, would be pushed into extreme poverty by the pandemic.

“Government has tried in its response to the pandemic with a comprehensive package for women- owned MSME in the ESP.

“I, however, propose short and long term goals aimed at expanding access to transformational soft skills, changing face of work, and a transfer of market relevant digital skills, as a retool to make them relevant for economic sustainability,” she said.

Dame Pauline Tallen, Minister of Women Affairs, pushed for the elimination of gender based violence, safer schools, and the strengthening of existing financial institutions with low interest rates for female -owned businesses.businesses, to resuscitate global economies from the impacts of COVID-19 pandemic.

They spoke at the Bank of Industry (BoI) webinar to celebrate the annual International Women’s Day (IWD), positing that such women specific initiatives would spur global socio-economic development.

The webinar, with the theme “Recognising Women’s Leadership in Enhancing Nigeria’s COVID-19 Recovery”, attracted prominent women in the private and public sectors, among others.

Mrs Ibukun Awosika, Chairman, First Bank of Nigeria Limited, said the pandemic largely affected businesses in the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) category, a level where women maximally played.

According to Awosika, the capital base of many womenowned businesses had become almost non-existent due to the pandemic. She, therefore, pushed for greater investments in digital literacy and E-commerce to reintegrate and revitalise the MSME into the business space and increase national productivity.