By Aditi Maheshwari
Lelemba Phiri a Zambian-born business owner, an award-winning educator, writer, keynote speaker and gender-lens investor is flexible and open enough to enter unchartered territories. Her belief in herself encourages her to take the leap of faith in business and in life.
India has contributed USD 300,000 to the United Nations agency for gender equality and women empowerment, a contribution lauded by the UN entity.
Rwanda’s Ministry of ICT and Innovation under its ‘ConnectRwanda initiative’ has distributed smartphones to over 3,000 female leaders in farmers’ cooperatives in the districts of Nyamagabe, Burera, Kirehe and Nyamasheke to aid and ease their access to agriculture information and enable them to disseminate it to other farmers.
By Miracle Nwankwo
Despite the rapid increase of unexpected players emerging in the financial services industry of South Africa, the sector is still largely dominated by men, with only very few women who have the opportunity to participate as employees and no female founder at all. However, with the emergence of Nthabeleng Likotsi – the founder of the first female mutual bank in South Africa, the narrative is about to change for women in the country.
Working mothers and their partners will be allowed to take paid bereavement leave after suffering a miscarriage or stillbirth in New Zealand.
Ethiopian President Her Excellency Sahle-Worke Zewde has launched the 50 Million African Women Speak (50MAWSP) platform in Addis Ababa with a call on the country’s women to embrace it and use it to grow their businesses.
Ethiopia became the thirteenth COMESA Member State to officially unveil the platform, which is an information and networking hub for women, providing them with resources to start, grow and scale up their businesses and to access financial and non-financial services.
By Alkali Amana
Miriam Defensor Santiago, the renowned Former Judge of the International Criminal Court, once said that ‘research shows that when women are empowered as political leaders, countries often experience higher standards of living with positive developments in education, infrastructure, and healthcare’, and her words may well be the future for Tanzania which recently had a change of government within its political structure to seat H.E Samia Suluhu Hassan as the current President of the country, following the demise of late President John Magufuli.
