While the imposition of gender on our Nation had negative intentions, we can transform this into a positive change and utilise it as a “check” on meeting the needs of us all- men and women. The Gender ideology we have today should be challenged so that as a concept, it can be used to transform our society to be inclusive of the representation of us all.
There’s still a business development and financial literacy education gap in orientation of start ups and scaling sustainable businesses in Nigeria. While these loans can be a way to support women in businesses, there are factors that still limit Economic Justice such as CAC registration, Tax, Human Capacity, Resources, Security, NAFDAC, Advertising Agency Fees, and then Leadership. Nigeria has more to do, to show accountability and commitment to give women, and push benefit realisation and economic advantage women led businesses bring. The social norms and expectations of women in Nigeria and the economics of Care, are areas that require addressing and long term interventions.
EmPOWERment has embedded meaning in varying contexts. The word in itself can mean the positioning for a positive and progressive possibility. It can mean enabling either a person, economy or environment, to achieve objectives that seemed unattainable. Empowerment is being used as a language and terminology for the re-positioning towards an ideal, somewhat better and more profitable outcome. While this language and meaning can be nuanced, there is no denying the fact that empowerment and empowering is binary focussed.
Analysing unemployment and underemployment figures require a more nuanced approach to determine the causative factors that has generated a multi-dimensional poverty status. Nigeria requires the work from her population to meet National and Global living conditions. This remains a National Issue.
ddressing these disparities is crucial for fostering a more inclusive and sustainable business environment. Environment of business scalability is also expensive to run with bills, taxes, resources that at are competent with capacity, infrastructure and security requires evaluation when reviewing loans and funding for women led businesses.
Female entrepreneurs in Nigeria contribute to 50% of the Nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). McKinsey Global Institute implies that this can go up to 19% in 2025 (up to 90 billion Dollars) if the systems are inclusive and equitable towards women in micro, medium small enterprises (MSMEs). But how can this happen when only 10% of commercial loans go towards women’s businesses and Nigerian women own 40% of businesses?
Media, one of the main tools of education and orientation, contribute to the subliminal exclusion of women in Global and National conversations as well as reinforcing the social stereotypes and norms by inactive gender sensitive reporting and mainstreaming.
A society that has raised girls to not think outside societal responsibilities, shy away from leading, silenced or shamed by structures of power will be impacted by material representation of them. Historically, this was not the norm as we have had (and still have) women who challenged and changed norms. Before we see ample representation[…]
Adejoke Bakare got her Michelin Starred recognition for culinary skills at her restaurant – Chishuru. The first person to get to this level with 6 Michelin Stars was Eugénie Brazier- a woman. Media coverage was more for Alain Ducasse (a man) than Eugnénie Brazier. Just as Rags Martel reported, Adejoke is the first black woman[…]