By Precious D. Freeman
The Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection in Collaboration with ECOWAS and the African Development Bank Group yesterday launched the 50 Million African Women Speak Platform, which is a practical initiative to empower millions of women in Africa.
During the launch, the Minister of Gender, Williametta E. Saydee-Tarr explained that the 50 Million African Women Speak Project (50MAWSP) is contributing to the economic and social empowerment of women across 38 African countries through the provision of a networking platform to access information on financial and non-financial services.
According to the Minister, 50MAWS is a digital platform which is available via web and on mobile devices as an app and is a practical initiative to empower millions of women in Africa to start, grow, and scale up business by providing a one-stop shop for their specific information needs.
“The 50MAWS platform facilitates a dynamic and engaging exchange of ideas among women entrepreneurs using in-built social media functionality to connect them with one another in ways that foster peer-to-peer learning, mentoring and the sharing of information and knowledge within communities, enabling access to financial services and market opportunities between urban and rural areas, and beyond borders, “she expressed.
She added that based on the names that were given to the President during the six counties tour, they are advocating for L 2,000. 00 M dollars that would go directly to Liberian women getting micro loans in order to improve their own businesses.
“It is mandated that the Minister of Agriculture provides the 16 million plus that is coming into their sector for farmers to be able to priortize favor of farmers because women who are involved in local trade continue to be victims to obstacles such as lack of access to loans, location and entrepreneur training, low property right etc. ”she explained.
“Liberian women can be sure of the empowerments and some strategies that the government had actually put into place through the Gender Ministry and their partners,” she boasted.
According to the Commissioner-Social Affairs and Gender, ECOWAS Commission, Dr. Siga Fatima Jagne said the 50MAWS is to facilitate the women empowerment and contains detail information on starting, managing and growing a business, designed with women entrepreneurs in mind.
“It is divided in two main sections, resources area with the information that businesswomen need and a networking area for women entrepreneurs to connect with, learn from and do business with each other,” she explained.
“The 50MAWS is funded by the African Development Bank (AFDP) and the project targets 50 million women in business and is implemented by the common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) the East African Community (EAC) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS),”she explained.