Gender-focused Development Initiatives

Conference participants reached consensus that development and poverty alleviation strategies that fail to target girls and women have little to no chance of success in Africa.

Ms. Ezekwesili drew attention to the Gender Entrepreneurship Markets (GEM) initiative launched by the Bank’s private sector arm, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), to enhance women’s access to finance and address gender barriers to the business environment. The $50 million GEM has benefited over 1,500 women in 18 sub-Saharan African countries and will be enhanced by a recent $120 million loan program that the IFC signed with EcoBank to benefit businesswomen in five countries.

In addition, the Bank has adopted a Gender Action Plan and launched an $11 million, three-year Adolescent Girls Initiative to train, mentor, empower and facilitate the transition of young African women to work in Liberia, Southern Sudan and Rwanda. In addition, 83 Bank-funded projects totaling $4.4 billion have female economic empowerment components; the majority of them (33) in agriculture, education (34), infrastructure (11) and private sector development (5).

Other speakers at the conference struck similar chords.

Speaking on behalf of the British ambassador to Washington, Sir Nigel Sheinwald, the deputy head of mission, Dominick Chilcott, stressed the link between women’s empowerment and development. The road to sustainable development, he said, is only attainable if it is built on a gender inclusive agenda.

“We must take the opportunities presented by the crisis to innovate and invest in women, whether it is proposals to introduce better social programs, finding ways of integrating women into the labor force, or reducing discrimination in financial markets,” he said, citing remarks by Sheinwald.

In a video message, Ms. Sarah Brown, the spouse of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, spoke of the need for world leaders to tackle “the many injustices that remain” against women.
Ambassador Melanne Verveer, U.S. President Barack Obama’s Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women’s Issues at the State Department, urged development agencies to “think women”.

“You cannot beat poverty without putting women at the center of your development strategies,” she said.

“Women’s equality is not just the right thing to do, it is also smart economics,” she added, paraphrasing the World Bank. She pointed out that women were key to food security and agriculture; essential players in the promotion of the rights of the child; major actors in health care provision; yet continued to suffer discrimination in powerful board rooms; and on higher rungs of corporate ladders.