mylo among first companies to receive Consumer Finance FRA Approval for Digital Onboarding in Egypt
mylo, the innovative fintech company born out of B.TECH, announced that it has received official ...
WB: Closing gender employment gap could boost Egyptian economy by around 56%
The World Bank analysis conducted in 2024 revealed that closing the gender employment gap could boost the economy by around 56%.
Various efforts and initiatives are being implemented to increase women’s labor force participation. These efforts are guided by the National Strategy for the Empowerment of Egyptian Women 2030, which includes an emphasis on increasing women’s participation in leadership roles, enhancing workforce equality and participation, ensuring women’s rights, and promoting gender equality through legal frameworks.
Ensuring that underlying obstacles to women’s labor force participation are well understood and adequately addressed is integral to realizing women’s full contribution to the workforce and economy.
The National Council for Women (NCW), together with the World Bank, has published a report establishing a systematic measurement framework designed to enhance policies and interventions that promote female labor force participation.
The report finds that if a safe and supportive environment is provided, women are more likely to be willing and encouraged by their families to join the labor force.
Empowering women to start their own businesses is a double win for Egypt, especially in light of the integral role of inclusive private sector-led job creation in Egypt’s economic prosperity.
A key national initiative in this effort is the expansion of the Takaful and Karama Cash Transfer Program supported by the World Bank. This program has introduced digital payments through Meeza cards, benefiting women, who make up 75% of its recipients, and providing them with social and economic empowerment opportunities.
In addition to financial support, Takaful and Karama connects beneficiaries to the FORSA program, which focuses on creating livelihood opportunities. FORSA provides women beneficiaries with assets and financial and technical training to help set up micro-businesses to generate sustainable incomes.
Approximately 26,000 beneficiaries received support from FORSA, with around 70% receiving assets or micro business trainings. Of the beneficiaries, 76.5% were women, 44% were youth, and 4.87% were persons with disabilities.
Entrepreneurship and self-employment, particularly e-commerce, are highly desirable among women due to the assumed flexibility of working hours and freedom to work from home. Egypt’s Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprise Development Agency has a strong focus on promoting female entrepreneurs.
In 2024, the agency disbursed approximately 80,000 loans, with 50% of the loans going to women. The World Bank’s Catalyzing Entrepreneurship for Job Creation program is currently working with the agency to support Egyptian entrepreneurs – with a focus on women and youth– to start and expand their businesses.
Since its start in January 2020, it has created or maintained over 408,829 jobs and helped around 200,00 beneficiaries, with 43% being women.
To promote, incentivize, and institutionalize gender equity in the Egyptian private sector, the World Bank, in collaboration with the National Council for Women (NCW) and the UK Embassy in Egypt, developed the Egyptian Gender Equity Seal certification.
This model promotes gender equity in the private sector by building a series of good practices for companies to adopt in the areas of recruitment, career development, family-work balance, and sexual harassment policies.
To enhance women’s participation in Egypt’s private sector, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private sector arm of the World Bank Group, launched the Egypt Women’s Employment project (EWE) and the Egypt2Inclusion project (E2I). Through EWE and E2I, IFC supported four companies (Metro Markets, Integrated Diagnostics Holding (IDH), Abu Auf, and Misr Insurance Holding) in closing gender gaps, recruiting, retaining, and promoting women.
As a result, IDH, Wadi Foods, and Abu Auf earned Equity, Diversity, and Gender Equality (EDGE) Gender Certification. IFC helped Misr Insurance Holding draft inclusive policies and trained Metro Markets’ HR on gender diversity.
اترك تعليقا