International Women's Day: Africa's businesswomen will not be ignored

Editor's note: Dr. Beth Dunford is the African Development Bank Group's vice president for agriculture, human and social development. The bank's Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa program and other work on gender, women and civil society are under her portfolio. The article reflects the author's opinions and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

There is transformational change taking place in Africa's financial sector that is unlocking opportunities and access to finance for women entrepreneurs. Commercial banks and other financial institutions, long stuck in the stereotype that women can't handle their finances, are stepping up to the reality that investing in Africa's women-led businesses is good for the finance sector's bottom line.

The African Development Bank Group's Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa initiative, or AFAWA, is helping reduce the estimated $49 billion financing gap between what Africa's women entrepreneurs need to grow their businesses and what they receive in business ecosystems.

For example, men are more likely to receive loans and other financial services because, in part, societal barriers and tradition leave Africa's women without deeds to land, accumulated savings, or other assets and collateral needed to successfully apply for financing.

Our research shows that overall, African women know how to run their businesses and are significantly less likely to default on a loan. AFAWA provides incentives for Africa's financial institutions to create financing tailored to the unique needs of women-run businesses. It also provides capacity-building training to build women entrepreneurs' success in securing financing and scaling up their businesses, as well as advocacy for governments to create or support more gender-inclusive policy environments.

In under five years, the African Development Bank, through AFAWA, has approved $2.5 billion in financing, with more than $1.2 billion already distributed to women entrepreneurs through a network of 185 AFAWA partner financial institutions in 44 African countries. Overall, more than 24,000 African women have benefited from AFAWA-backed financing and capacity building programs.

I recently visited one of those women, Elisabeth Tano, who launched a coffee roasting company in 2016 in Cote d'Ivoire's commercial capital, Abidjan. However, she experienced challenges growing from a small and medium enterprise to simply an enterprise or agribusiness.

With the support of AFAWA-backed financing upwards of $500,000, Tano increased her turnover by 20 percent in just one year and expanded her team of workers by 30 percent – creating more jobs for youth and women in her community. Today, her Café Tano Torrefaction brand distributes coffee products in Côte d'Ivoire and neighboring Mali and Burkina Faso.

Women benefiting from AFAWA are running companies expanding medical tech healthcare access in West Africa, keeping some of the most recognizable buildings in Nairobi's skyline clean, transporting and providing medical services to mining communities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, expanding luxury car and boating lines to clients in Nigeria – the businesses impacted are just as diverse as the women leading them. We want to see more business and financial institutions grow through AFAWA.

On International Women's Day, this year themed "For ALL women and girls: Rights. Equality. Empowerment," we must recognize that women's financial empowerment and a woman's right to equal access to financing are key to developing businesses, communities, economies, and countries. This year also marks three decades since the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, which made a promise to the world of a future where women would have the same opportunities as men.

AFAWA, created by African Development Bank Group President Dr. Akinwumi A. Adesina and officially launched by the French G7 presidency in 2019, is propelling Africa toward that future envisioned in Beijing – but there is still much to do. Investing in women should not be seen only as an issue of fairness or doing the right thing. Investing in women is an accelerator of development, an engine of growth.

AFAWA is supported by partners and donors like the Women's Entrepreneurs Finance Initiative, G7 participating countries Canada, France, Germany and Italy, along with the Netherlands and Sweden. With this support and partnership, we are changing the mindset of Africa's finance sector, helping commercial banks and other financial institutions understand there's a largely untapped market of women-run small and medium enterprises out there who are potential customers.

Africa has the highest proportion of women entrepreneurs in the world. Africa's businesswomen will not be ignored.

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