During a panel discussion, proposals were made towards ameliorating the prevailing situation.

The ongoing forum for small and medium-sized enterprises holding at the Bonanjo Party House in Douala entered day three yesterday December 2. The day was marked by a panel discussion on Female Entrepreneurship with Alice Maguedio, the President of the Wouri Divisional Retailers’ Syndicate (SYCODEW), Jacqueline Ndongmo, a Douala-based female entrepreneur and Benjamin Kisso, Regional Director of the National Employment Fund.

It would be noted that the women folk constitute 52% of the population, with between 60 and 80% involved in food production. In time past, they were limited to a classical role of housewives. But as time evolved, many have demarked themselves by attainting laudable strides in every domain in life. However, most women are confronted with bottlenecks in the access to finance, stereotypes in the exercise of certain professions, and financial apathy towards enterprises owned or/and controlled by them. With an access to income estimated at 10%, while that to asset is relatively one per cent, only 26% of Small and Medium-sized enterprises in Sub-Saharan Africa are owned by women.

During the discussions which ended with an interactive session, it was recommended that gender approach and equity should be fully implemented in every domain; men should be educated towards encouraging female entrepreneurship, the creation of a bank for women and networking to preserve their undertakings.