The G7 leaders, under the leadership of France’s President Emmanuel Macron, have awarded US $251 million to the Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa (AFAWA) Initiative.
The G7 Summit, 2019 edition, took place in France between the 25th to 27th of August.
President Macron described this move as a step towards championing for gender equity.
Speaking at the Summit, he said, “The AFAWA initiative comes from an African organization, the African Development Bank, which works with African guarantee funds and a network of African banks.”
President Macron stated that he is particularly proud to be the current G7 president, and to be supporting the program.
In 2015, the Africa Development Bank was tasked with implementing a mechanism that would enable the financing of women’s economic empowerment.
This took place at the African Heads of States Summit in 2015.
The task resulted in the establishment of the AFAWA Initiative which works as follows:
- Conducting training to enhance productivity and growth so as to strengthen the capacity of women entrepreneurs.
- Creating incentives for lending to women in business.
- Involving African governments to support reforms and break barriers to women in business.
Close to 40% of all SMEs in Africa are operated by women.
AFAWA’s aim is to raise upto US $5 Billion for African women entrepreneurs; $1 Billion of which will be provided by the African Development Bank.
AFDB president, Akinwumi Adesina, said, “This is a great day for African women, investing in women entrepreneurs in Africa is important, because women are not only Africa’s future, they are Africa’s present,” he added, “This financing effort for women is the most significant in the continent’s history.”
