The International Labour Organization (ILO) and UNCTAD have teamed up to ensure that the role of information and communication technologies (ICTs) is fully reflected when assessing the environment for women's entrepreneurship.
An ILO/UNCTAD Assessor Training on Women's Entrepreneurship Development and ICTs is taking place on 10-12 April 2013 in Dar es Salaam, United Republic of Tanzania, which will prepare the participants to assess the environment for women's entrepreneurship in East Africa.
Those trained will use an updated version of ILO's methodology for assessing Women's Entrepreneurship Development (WED) environments.
Following the launch of UNCTAD's Information Economy Report 2011, which studied how ICTs can boost private-sector development, ILO invited UNCTAD to assist in integrating the ICT dimension into its WED Assessment Guide.
The new version is the first such tool. It systematically reflects the role of ICT in support of women entrepreneurs. The Dar es Salaam session will prepare participants to use the ILO methodology to assess the environment for women's entrepreneurship in Kenya, Uganda, and the United Republic of Tanzania.
The training has been co-organized by ILO's WED Office and the ICT Analysis Section of UNCTAD's Division on Technology and Logistics. The workshop will consider critical forms of support that can enable women entrepreneurs to grow their enterprises, thereby creating jobs and raising incomes for themselves and others.
The initiative of integrating ICTs into the WED methodology is part of the joint ILO/UNCTAD Project on Leveraging ICTs for the Support of Women Entrepreneurs, which is funded by the Government of Sweden (through the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency). The training workshop is being undertaken as part of an ILO project promoting WED in Kenya, Uganda, and the United Republic of Tanzania. The project is funded by Irish Aid.
The training was preceded on 8 and 9 April by a series of focus groups for women entrepreneurs that aimed at testing the ICT component of the WED methodology.
For further information on the training workshop, please contact Marie Sicat, Associate Economic Affairs Officer, ICT Analysis Section, Division on Technology and Logistics, UNCTAD (marie.sicat@unctad.org), or Joni Simpson, Global Coordinator and Specialist, Women's Entrepreneurship and Entrepreneurship Education, ILO (simpson@ilo.org).
