Categories
Our Voices

Our Voices

Sponsors Remarks for W20 Empower Event 29 October 2025

7 November 2025

When more women have work, more lives change for the better. Families, communities, and even countries can be transformed. This is due to the exponential effect that women employment creates.

An investment into women’s economic opportunities creates new pockets of reinvestment. Studies show that employed women reinvest up to ninety percent of their earnings into their families and surrounding communities. Financial support for women employment, therefore, also economically benefits others.

This financial cascade can have a powerful and profound effect, not only for women in today’s labour market, but for the next generation. Within the following decade, one-point-two billion (1,2B)  young people will enter the global workforce. They will have to compete for only four-hundred-and-twenty-million (430M) jobs, leaving seven-hundred-and-eighty-million (720B) job seekers without meaningful employment.

Of these millions of enthusiastic and ambitious young people left unemployed, the vast majority will be women.

Tonight, we are gathered here to advocate for the generations of women who face increasingly challenging circumstances to participate in their respective economies. Despite being willing and able to work, these women’s professional potential has not been rewarded with stable employment.

As the future drivers of economies, advancing women employment and entrepreneurship must be placed at the forefront of economic discussions. For a continent like ours, a resilient and prosperous future isn’t possible until we start economically embracing Africa’s mothers and duaghters.

There is an African proverb that says, “There is no beauty but the beauty of action.” The challenges are clear, the way forward less so but what is evident is that we must now financially support the women of Africa – and of the world – with our collective actions.

While investing in the formal employment sector is critical, women entrepreneurship will be the powerful enabler of both financial inclusion and global economic growth. Here the private sector needs to invest in building and growing women-owned businesses, who in turn create jobs and build economies.

With one of the highest rates of female entrepreneurship in the world, nearly one in four women in sub-Saharan Africa manage their own business. Despite this significant economic contribution, these women entrepreneurs face a global financing gap of one-point-seven trillion dollars.

To bridge this momentous gap, we need to create permanent change for both women entrepreneurs and the economies in which they operate.

Financial inclusion must start with redefining the funding approach – not only from a venture capital perspective but from a commercial lending model too. In South Africa, women-led firms receive less than ten percent of commercial loans and their applications are rejected twice the rate than male-owned businesses.

Early-stage enterprises must be assessed with a different risk perception lens. Risk management must be reframed, especially in low-margin sectors and informal environments. By redefining what a bankable business is, financial institutions can create a more inclusive system when it comes to funding. Incorporating non-traditional assessment criteria into investment frameworks will ensure that more women-led businesses are welcomed into the entrepreneurial community.

Recognising women entrepreneurs with redesigned financial instruments will also have an important generational impact. By investing in today’s women entrepreneurs, we can encourage the next generation to harness their entrepreneurial spirit too.

As a leading pan-African financial institution and champion for the gender, diversity, and inclusion agenda, Absa is committed to advancing Africa’s emerging women entrepreneurs. This is why we have directed over three-point-eight billion rand of procurement spend towards women-owned businesses. The bank also launched women and youth-specific financial product solutions to provide better access to funding, bespoke training programmes, and business networking and mentorship opportunities.

Africa’s women are ready to take their rightful place as employed professionals and empowered entrepreneurs – an ambition they share with women across the world. As the continent’s financial stewards, we must also be advocates for women economic participation. This is how we will ensure that the continent’s legacy becomes synonymous with financial inclusiveness.

7 November 2025

When more women have work, more lives change for the better. Families, communities, and even countries can be transformed. This is due to the exponential effect that women employment creates.

An investment into women’s economic opportunities creates new pockets of reinvestment. Studies show that employed women reinvest up to ninety percent of their earnings into their families and surrounding communities. Financial support for women employment, therefore, also economically benefits others.

This financial cascade can have a powerful and profound effect, not only for women in today’s labour market, but for the next generation. Within the following decade, one-point-two billion (1,2B)  young people will enter the global workforce. They will have to compete for only four-hundred-and-twenty-million (430M) jobs, leaving seven-hundred-and-eighty-million (720B) job seekers without meaningful employment.

Of these millions of enthusiastic and ambitious young people left unemployed, the vast majority will be women.

Tonight, we are gathered here to advocate for the generations of women who face increasingly challenging circumstances to participate in their respective economies. Despite being willing and able to work, these women’s professional potential has not been rewarded with stable employment.

As the future drivers of economies, advancing women employment and entrepreneurship must be placed at the forefront of economic discussions. For a continent like ours, a resilient and prosperous future isn’t possible until we start economically embracing Africa’s mothers and duaghters.

There is an African proverb that says, “There is no beauty but the beauty of action.” The challenges are clear, the way forward less so but what is evident is that we must now financially support the women of Africa – and of the world – with our collective actions.

While investing in the formal employment sector is critical, women entrepreneurship will be the powerful enabler of both financial inclusion and global economic growth. Here the private sector needs to invest in building and growing women-owned businesses, who in turn create jobs and build economies.

With one of the highest rates of female entrepreneurship in the world, nearly one in four women in sub-Saharan Africa manage their own business. Despite this significant economic contribution, these women entrepreneurs face a global financing gap of one-point-seven trillion dollars.

To bridge this momentous gap, we need to create permanent change for both women entrepreneurs and the economies in which they operate.

Financial inclusion must start with redefining the funding approach – not only from a venture capital perspective but from a commercial lending model too. In South Africa, women-led firms receive less than ten percent of commercial loans and their applications are rejected twice the rate than male-owned businesses.

Early-stage enterprises must be assessed with a different risk perception lens. Risk management must be reframed, especially in low-margin sectors and informal environments. By redefining what a bankable business is, financial institutions can create a more inclusive system when it comes to funding. Incorporating non-traditional assessment criteria into investment frameworks will ensure that more women-led businesses are welcomed into the entrepreneurial community.

Recognising women entrepreneurs with redesigned financial instruments will also have an important generational impact. By investing in today’s women entrepreneurs, we can encourage the next generation to harness their entrepreneurial spirit too.

As a leading pan-African financial institution and champion for the gender, diversity, and inclusion agenda, Absa is committed to advancing Africa’s emerging women entrepreneurs. This is why we have directed over three-point-eight billion rand of procurement spend towards women-owned businesses. The bank also launched women and youth-specific financial product solutions to provide better access to funding, bespoke training programmes, and business networking and mentorship opportunities.

Africa’s women are ready to take their rightful place as employed professionals and empowered entrepreneurs – an ambition they share with women across the world. As the continent’s financial stewards, we must also be advocates for women economic participation. This is how we will ensure that the continent’s legacy becomes synonymous with financial inclusiveness.