The “Women’s Investment Club” (WIC) Senegal and Ecobank have signed a one billion CFA franc (USD1,600,000) collaboration contract to support female entrepreneurship in Senegal.
Ecobank’s Managing Director, Sahid Yallou, and Evelyne Dioh Simpa, Executive Director of WIC Capital Senegal, officially handed over the symbolic cheque.
This one-billion-franc financial partnership is core component of the “Ellever” program, which aims to support women’s activities that encourage financial independence by making it easier for them to use modern and suitable financial instruments.
Despite the fact that Senegal has a well-developed and active entrepreneurial fabric, one of the most significant hurdles to expansion is a lack of capital. This is how the project helps female company owners and entrepreneurs,” Yallou explained.
Female business, he claims, has enormous potential, but women’s capacity is underexploited. “We’ve chosen a collaborative strategy to ensure that we’re focusing on the relevant targets and issues,” he explained.
Evelyne Dioh Simpa maintains that by uniting resources and efforts, it will be feasible to guarantee that women-owned SMEs receive ever more sustainable financial support for growth. “This collaboration comes at an excellent time for female enterprises,” she believes.
WIC Capital is the first investment fund in Senegal and Ivory Coast that exclusively targets women-led businesses. It was launched in March 2019 by the Women’s Investment Club (WIC) Senegal.
Local and international private and institutional investors share their resources to fund in micro and small women-owned firms (MSMEs) in Senegal and Ivory Coast through the 11 billion CFA franc investment scheme. The Fund invests in firms across all industries that were started by women, are registered or managed by at least 50% women, or have a management team that is mostly female.
Techbuild’s Take
Given the number of female entrepreneurs, Africa accounts for the largest share. In fact, in Africa, women are more likely than males to start a business. Women account for 58 percent of the continent’s self-employed.
Profiting from Parity, a new World Bank analysis, demonstrates that women entrepreneurs in Sub-Saharan Africa keep on making lower earnings than men (34 percent less on average).
Creating more chances for Africa’s diligent women entrepreneurs should include cooperating with the private sector to utilize synergies.
We believe that this funding would go a long way to first, encourage more females to explore entrepreneurship and also it will help to close the significant economic gap that appears to be a huge lag in the overall growth of the continent’s economy.
The impact of investing in female businesses is multiplied. Women are more likely than males to reinvest a larger share of their earnings in their families and communities.
Indeed, it is widely proven that when women manage a larger share of home resources, the family spends a reasonable sum on money on feeding and children’s education, and children who are healthier and more learned are better positioned to contribute to a growing economy.
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