The African women enterpreneur : an agenda for enhancing capacity and empowerment

Abstract

The current crisis in the World economic order and its harsh reflection in the African economies in the form of diminished resources overall clearly calls for a greater contribution of African entrepreneurship to the continents development. In this context, African women entrepreneurs are in an especially critical position taking into account the multitude of their responsibilities and the formidable constraints they face given the widening gap between those responsibilities and the resources available to them. In relation to the above, the principal aims of this presentation are to: 1) Review the role of entrepreneurship in Africa's development, with special emphasis on the role of female entrepreneurs; 2) Analyze the situation of the African women entrepreneurs and the primary constraints they face 3) present some of the current actions undertaken by various institutions in their favor; 4) Make recommendations for different levels of intervention and action.