Female entrepreneurs benefit from Access Bank’s ‘Womenpreneur’ series …Keystone Bank too

In furtherance of its commitment to empower female entrepreneurs across Nigeria, Access Bank has extended its Womenpreneur Business Workshop to Kaduna State.

According to a statement from the bank, to give the women in Kaduna a professional business capacity-building experience, Access Bank’s W Academy partnered with the Enterprise Development Centre (EDC); the Entrepreneurship arm of Lagos Business School to drive this workshop.

Speaking on the purpose of the workshop, Group Head, Inclusive Banking, Access Bank Plc, Mrs Ope Wemi-Jones said, “Since 2006, the Bank has continued in its commitment to drive women’s economic empowerment in the nation. The Womenpreneur Business Workshop is intended to educate and enlighten Nigerian women on the fundamentals in business which will eventually help them attain their full potentials”.

In its fifth edition, the Womenpreneur Business Workshop is one of the flagship trainings of the W Academy under the Bank’s W Initiative, designed to address the lack of access to entrepreneurial skills, finance, networking, and management skills; which are the key barriers to women’s economic inclusion.

So far, business women in Lagos, Port Harcourt, Ibadan and Abuja have benefitted immensely from the workshop with over 1200 female entrepreneurs testifying to have increased their business network, improved their business model and are thriving through the economic constraints with ease.

This first of its kind workshop the bank said was highly discounted and targeted at small and medium scaled women entrepreneurs. Access Bank’s commitment to empower female entrepreneurs continues to foster the growth of SME’s in Nigeria with its resultant economic benefits.

Meanwhile, Keystone Bank held the reins of the Women Empowerment segment of the recently concluded International OkpeKpe Road Race. The Okpekpe Road Race – an annual 10 kilometre marathon organized by Pamodzi Sports marketing Nigeria Ltd in partnership with the Edo State Government – is recognized by the International Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF) and attracts competitors from all over Africa.

The Acting Managing Director of Keystone Bank, Mr Hafiz Bakare stated that Keystone Bank is committed to supporting initiatives that empower women and youths explaining that this is in line with the pillars of the Bank’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). He added that women are the bedrock of social and moral values and as such support for programmes like this is not only significant but essential.

As part of the Women Empowerment Programme sponsored by Keystone Bank, 10 indigenous women were trained and provided with start-up kits in various vocational skills. Speaking at the event, the Group Head, Oil & Gas (Corporate Banking) at Keystone Bank, Mrs Nnenna Kayode-Lawal said, “Beyond being one of our CSR pillars, the focus on supporting women in the society stems from the fact that women remain the largest untapped reservoir of talent in the world. According to a study by the Clinton Foundation, 41 per cent of Nigerian women are entrepreneurs compared to only approximately 10 per cent in the US and 5.7 per cent in the UK. While according to Global Entrepreneurship Monitoring’s annual report, women actually outnumber men in the entrepreneur space in countries like Ghana, Nigeria and Zambia.

Many of these women include small scale operators in the rural areas who; if provided with the right kind of support, can have significant effects on the economy. ”

Backed with this report, Keystone Bank is charged to explore all strategies to make significant impact in this terrain.