"women are more vulnerable because of the gender bias raising out of the traditional and cultural norms" - Minister Amongi. as she opened the GROW Project.

 

Today 21st June 2023, Hon. Betty Amongi Ongom the minister of gender, labour and social development opened the national rollout and sensitisation of the generating growth opportunities and productivity for women enterprises (GROW) project.

The ceremony graced by national and international digitaries was organised by Ministry of Gender labour and social development (MGLSD) and was held at Kololo Ceremonial grounds.

The workshop stated today and it's to introduce the GROW project in order to enable you understand it and mobilize Uandans for project implementation.

The GROW is a government of Uganda project financed by the world bank to the tune of us€217million. It's a national project that covers the entire country including all constituencies. 

It is an accelerator project for women enterprise development that will build on the achievements so far made by the government in women economic empowerment.

In her speech she said that Uganda's population of about 45m people comprise of 51% women and girls compared to 49% of men and boys. However, women are more vulnerable because of the gender bias raising out of the traditional and cultural norms. Because of this, women are less represented in the economic domain of the country.

In the labour market, the labour force participation rate for women is 39% compared to 58% for men; implying that only four in ten men. Data from UBOS also indicate that unemployment for women is higher at 16.5% compared to that of men (10.4%), with female youth suffering the greatest blunt (20.4%). This implies that sustaining livelihoods is more difficult for women than men.

It's through this background that the government through the ministry of gender, labour and social development approached the world bank for financing the project dabbed the Generating growth opportunities and productivity for women enterprise (GROW).

The project arises out of the need to respond to the needs of women Entrepreneur who want to grow their businesses, sustain their self-employment and also create more jobs. The project development objective is to increase access to services that enhance transition of female owned businesses from micro to small and from small to medium enterprises.

It focuses on empowering women enterprises in high growth sectors with potential to create more jobs and lift many people out of poverty.

Government of the Republic of Uganda has been allocated grant funds (the “Grant”) from the World Bank which are administered by the International Development Association (IDA) (the “Bank”) towards implementation of the (GROW) Project.

The Project Development Objective is to increase access to entrepreneurial 

services that enable women entrepreneurs to grow their enterprises in targeted locations, including host and refugee communities. 

The Project is being implemented jointly by (MGLSD) and Private Sector Foundation 

Uganda (PSFU).