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Mainstreaming women entrepreneurship and empowerment in Tanzania’s development agenda
The ILO - Women’s Entrepreneurship Development and Economic Empowerment project organized a three-day long training for Tanzanian women development associations to build their capacity in mainstreaming entrepreneurship and empowerment as a key engine for development.
Dar es Salaam (ILO News) – Task force members of Tanzania’s Women Economic Development National Action Plan (NAP) and key stakeholders of Women Entrepreneurs Associations (WEAs) were trained from 10-12 February 2016 by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) to better plan advocacy campaigns and mainstream women entrepreneurship and empowerment in government development programs and budgets.
The training included interactive sessions on gender mainstreaming in entrepreneurship and economic empowerment, formalization of women enterprises, advocacy on provision of 30% of public procurement to be sourced from women and Business Development Services (BDS) for youth and people with disabilities.
Participants were briefed on strategies and steps required in an advocacy process and provided with knowledge and tools on how to prepare evidence based policy proposals.
The objective is for the trainees to continue to support the Women Entrepreneurship Development (WED) NAP implementation process through participation in policy review as well as lobbying and advocating for resource allocation from national government.
WED – NAP for Tanzania
In 2014, a task force led by the Ministry of Industries and Trade, Tanzania, directorate of SMEs, in collaboration with the WEDEE project, developed a WED NAP 2016-2019. The task force was composed of representatives from the private sector including financial and non-financial service providers, ICT providers, WEAs, Civil Society Organization, Government institutions and employers and workers organisations.
The task force would be trained in strengthening its capacity to articulate areas of policy and programs that Tanzanian Government should improve in making the business environment conducive for women entrepreneurs.
The Action Plan has three main outcomes: Strengthening WEAs capacity to stand for members’ collective voice and empower women to make better use of business opportunities; engendering policies, regulations and programs to effectively serve both women and men and packaging; and delivering BDS and financial services to respond to the entrepreneurs’ needs.
The ILO through its WED programs has been promoting women’s entrepreneurship development as a means to job creation, women’s economic empowerment and gender equality. The above program is working to strengthen the capacity of local, national and international partners to support women to start and improve their businesses by providing specific approaches for women entrepreneurs to achieve self-sufficiency and generate decent jobs while also taking action to identify and remove systemic barriers through policy work.
