"The Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE) launched the Advancing Women’s Empowerment Fund (AWEF) in 2019 with support from the Visa Foundation and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The overall goal of AWEF-funded projects is to address the gender financing gap for women-owned small and growing businesses (SGBs) in developing economies. The first round of grantmaking, AWEF Asia, funded eight entrepreneur support organizations (ESOs) in Cambodia, Vietnam, Myanmar, the Philippines, Pakistan, and India, as well as programs serving the region as a whole. This report summarizes the lessons learned from these grants."
ANDE is analyzing the promising project data from AWEF Asia projects, which concluded at the end of 2021. One of the early key learnings is that women entrepreneurs who participated in AWEF Asia funded programs reported increased confidence, self-efficacy, financial and investment literacy, and ability to critically evaluate potential investment and financing options.
ANDE spoke to Jona Resphiti of MIT-D-Lab about the organization’s ANDE-funded project under the Advancing Women’s Empowerment Fund to better prepare female founders seeking capital and support investors in bringing more inclusivity to their practices, including impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the project in India and an upcoming simulation of what it’s like to be a female founder trying to raise $5 million.
"This is an interactive resource designed to equip you with the knowledge and strategies required to meet the needs of women entrepreneurs. This handbook can be applied in the context of a women-only programme or to better support women founders within a mixed gender programme. We recognise that gender is not binary and so depending on the context, you may choose to use this handbook as a guide to reflect on how to make your programme more accessible, inclusive and equitable for other genders as well."
"Women-led and women-owned businesses continue to be a largely untapped resource for economic growth in emerging economies. There is promising data, highlighted in this report, for the opportunity to strengthen the entrepreneurial ecosystems supporting women in emerging economies, despite the negative impacts of the pandemic. This report underscores the potential for women’s businesses, especially startup businesses and high-growth entrepreneurs, and emphasizes the need to fill critical gaps in access to financing, technology, social networks and training. "
"In 2018, the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE), with the support of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), launched the Gender Lens Impact Measurement (GLIM) Fund to enhance the awareness, rigor, and quality of impact measurement for organizations supporting entrepreneurs with a gender lens approach. Each grant from the fund went to a partnership between small and growing business (SGB) support organizations in Latin America and researchers to use measurement for driving improved gender-inclusive strategies. This synthesis report summarises the tools and lessons from these grants on using measurement to increase gender inclusion for SGB support organizations."
"Women entrepreneurs are critical to a thriving and inclusive economy, and yet they face numerous challenges in growing their businesses. These challenges are compounded for women climate entrepreneurs (WCEs), given limited research that assesses the issues or presents actionable recommendations to the wider ecosystem. This knowledge product identifies challenges and opportunities for WCEs with a focus on Sub-Saharan Africa - specifcally, Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, South Africa and Malawi."