Mozambique Launches Second Women's Economic Forum

Mozambique’s business community is strengthening its commitment to women’s economic empowerment with the launch of the second edition of the Women’s Economic Forum, an initiative designed to advance female entrepreneurship, encourage policy dialogue, and improve opportunities for women-led businesses across the country. Organized by the Mozambique Chamber of Commerce (CCM), the forum was officially launched in Maputo and aims to address the key challenges limiting women’s participation in the national economy while identifying practical solutions to support their long-term growth.

During this launch, Vice-President of CCM, Ilda Matabel pointed to the important contribution of women to Mozambique's economy in the strategic sectors, including agriculture, trade and manufacturing. She said that women entrepreneurs though their contribution is significant to the productive workforce, still encountered various challenges in the way of expansion of business and sustainability of their business.

“While women form a large percentage of the productive labour force in strategic industries like agriculture, trade and manufacturing, they are still constrained in many aspects while operating their businesses”, Ilda said.

The forum is anticipated to be an open forum in which women entrepreneurs, policy makers, private sector leaders and development stakeholders will be able to share their thoughts, voice their concerns, and brainstorm potential joint solutions to improve women's involvement in economic development.

Key Highlights

• Around 1,500 women entrepreneurs from all over Mozambique will gather at Forum
• Recommendations will help in making better policies and procedures for policy support towards the development of women entrepreneurs' businesses
• The focus areas are: financing, leadership, innovation, market access, and capacity building

Mozambique Chamber of Commerce Executive Director, Teresa Muenda highlighted the need for an enabling environment for women entrepreneurs and asked for more institutional support to promote the growth of female entrepreneurship.

Teresa said that “there is a need to promote a more conducive climate for women entrepreneurship by strengthening access to finance, capacity development and markets, noting that these are still critical in supporting women-owned businesses to scale and become more competitive”.

The second edition of the Women's Economic Forum will gather about 1500 women entrepreneurs who will get a chance to present their product/service and join discussions on Leadership, Innovation, Public Policy, Business Development, and Entrepreneurship. It is hoped that the event will provide an opportunity to network, share knowledge and collaborate with other industries.

One of the major outcomes of the forum will be the development of a comprehensive document with recommendations and strategic actions to be taken for improving the business environment of women entrepreneurs. The document will then be submitted to the Government of Mozambique and private sector stakeholders for future policy development and enhancing women's economic inclusion.

“The forum is a sign of greater awareness of the role women play in Mozambique's economic and social development”, according to Paulina Cueteia, the representative of the National Directorate of Gender.

Paulina said that holding the forum reflects the understanding of women's role in the country's economic social development and that policies to ensure women's greater and more active involvement in the economy should be adopted.

The second edition of the Women's Economic Forum will be held on 21st and 22nd October in Maputo City, and is expected to be a key forum for policy development, boost women's entrepreneurship and promote women's economic empowerment in Mozambique.