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Add to Preferred SourcesCommonwealth Secretary-General Patricia Scotland has urged bold action to close the persistent economic gap between men and women and help pave the way to achieving the SDGs.
“Working for the economic empowerment of women is not only the right thing to do, but it is also the smart thing to do,” she stated during a high-level panel at the World Investment Forum 2018 in Geneva. “It contributes to human development and inclusive growth as well as to prosperous business.”
The forum, held under the theme ‘Women’s economic empowerment – Transforming investments and enterprise’, brought leaders together with government, business, and civil society from across the world to discuss ways to unlock economic opportunities for women and girls, build financial security and contribute to economic growth.
Despite global efforts, large gender gaps remain. In the Commonwealth millions of women are under-employed, working in the informal sector or unemployed.
The Secretary-General said: “Failure to mobilize the potential productive capacity of these women results in a loss to the gross domestic product (GDP) of Commonwealth countries over a five-year period of hundreds of billions of dollars. Recent estimates indicate that economic gender parity could add an extra $240 billion to the GDP of an advanced economy within such a timescale.”
To address these issues, the Commonwealth Secretariat has developed a suite of toolkits to help member countries achieve the SDGs. The Secretary-General said they would enable countries to make swifter and more inclusive progress.
The Secretary-General also referred to the Commonwealth Trade Finance Facility, which was set up to support small and medium enterprises (SMEs) with access to trade finance, including businesses owned by women in smaller and more vulnerable Commonwealth countries. Five member countries have together invested $5 million in guarantee funding, with an ambition to leverage up to $300 million over three years.
Original source: The Commonwealth
Published on 39 October 2018