Sierra Leone - Women as Entrepreneurs - Petifu Chain

Sierra Leone - Women as Entrepreneurs - Petifu Chain

 

Scene 7 of the TVP documentary 
Playlist on Youtube    http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL29D89081CB67E5AD
 


⇒ Episode 3 - MDG 3: Promote gender equality and empower women

Women as entrepreneurs
 

Project implemented by Concern Worldwide, Concern Worldwide

Petifu Chain, Sierra Leone (http://www.concern.net/where-we-work/africa/sierra-leone) 

December 2010 

Co-financed by European Commission (Europeaid)

We are in the village of Petifu Chain in the Tonkolili district of Sierra Leone, a small country in West Africa that, in 2002, emerged from a decade of bloody civil war.

 

Ranked 180 among 187 countries on the human development index and ranked at the bottom of the gender development index, poverty and unemployment are the major challenges for Sierra Leone. Although the country has been experiencing substantial economic growth in recent years, nearly half the government revenue still comes from donors.

 

Women constitute 52% of the Sierra Leonean population and are most often heads of households and the primary earners for their families. Female genital mutilation, early motherhood, low literacy levels, high maternal mortality, sexual and gender-based violence, and laws discriminating against women are just some of the plights of the Sierra Leonean women. 

 

Women mostly work in petty trading and subsistence farming. Low literacy levels and the lack of skills hampers women from accessing better income earning opportunities. Women comprise over 90% of the country’s economic producers, providing 55% of the agricultural labour force and nearly 8% of wage employees in the non-agricultural sector. Yet, they cannot own land and whatever user rights they may acquire, are lost upon the death of their husbands.

 

The women of the village of Petifu Chain decided to change the course of their destinies. They established a women's group called Myogbo. In Temne, the local language, Myogbo means "Just try and God will give you". This is exactly what the women’s group is doing in cooperation with Concern Worldwide, a European non-government organisation working in Sierra Leone since 1996. Concern helps the Myogbo woman’s group to organise itself into Self Help Groups so that they could take small loans to start small businesses in the agricultural sector. Concern provides training to self help groups in basic business skills, book keeping, and advises women on updated techniques, equipment, market linkages, etc. so that women are able to manage their businesses successfully and earn a decent living.

 

Now, the women own small businesses that process, package and market farm produce. They are able to provide better nutrition for their children and are also able to fund their education and health care. Women have improved their lives and those of their families and have become agents of change in their communities.

 

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Additional notes

"If women are encouraged, they can be productive. Women also have a better understanding about the need to preserve their environment and eco-system. When women in Africa will start getting educated and empowered, Africa will change for the better”, says a local leader and parish priest.

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Myogbo is a woman's group in the Petifu Chain village in the Tonkolili district. Myogbo means "you just try and God will give you" in the local language of Temne in Sierra Leone. In an effort to combat poverty and empower women, Concern Worldwide, an international non government organisation, cooperates with the Myogbo group to support women entrepreneurship and help them cultivate farms. This improves women's access to reliable food supply, reduces their vulnerability to droughts, improves their access to water and generates income that can be spent on children’s education and health care.

Women play an important role in the economic development but often lack the skills and education to avail of their potentialities. They are usually excluded from access to finance for starting small business initiatives. Concern believes that the poor should have access to microfinance services to move out of poverty.


 

The European Commission financed project in Petifu Chain village facilitates women in accessing small business loans through self help groups and also helps them in acquiring skills and knowledge to run these enterprises.

"If women are encouraged, they can be productive. Women also have a better understanding about the need to preserve their environment and eco-system. Whe women in Africa will start getting educated and empowered, Africa will change for the better", says a local leader and parish priest.

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