No economy can be term viable without the import and the industry of women. Not just because they are the matriarch of the society, but also they carry the institutions, norms and culture in their hearts and pass it down generational lines for the society
According to the World Economic Forum (WEF) Nigeria is ranked 123rd out of the 146 countries on the 2022 global gender gap index, which measures access to resources and opportunities in countries. This means that an average man in Nigeria has over 60% chance of having access to economic resources than a woman. This in-balance has been a source of concern to man although it must be emphasized that half of those who have shown concern overtime have only paid lip service to addressing the issue.
Consistently seen at the forefront of this empowerment has been the Nestle Nigeria. When the organization came up with the Empowering Rural Women in Nigeria Project, a lot of us looked on from afar with a high level of skepticism. We thought maybe its just one of those CSR Projects meant to fulfill all righteousness but as at today we call smile and say it’s a project that has been true to its ideals.
The Project which was designed to help rural women retailers scale up their business and sustain the new level of up to three times the size of their existing businesses, it’s a Creating Shared Value Initiative that Nestle has deployed to help build thriving communities by improving livelihoods.
As at June 2022, the Empowering Rural Women in Nigeria Project has moved over 200 women across all Nigeria’s geo-political zones in 5 phases moving from Ondo to Osogbo, Protacourt to Bayelsa in the south-South, Bauchi to the inter-lands of Abuja to bring this lofty dreams to a reality.
Some of us who witnessed the Osogbo event could see the joy and the tears of oy that flowed freely when 50 women received grants worth 300% of their monthly sales in form of Nestle’s product. For me the height of it was not just scaling up these women, its is ensuring that they remain up in these endeavours as Nestle enrolled them for an training and mentorship program that will improve there overall business capacity.
Think of it this way, a lot of these women have never known the concept of Merchandising, customer service, book-keeping, marketing; them learning about these things improved their sales by over 400%. Imagine its effect on the economy. In the next 3 years expect some of these women to have climb up the distributorship ladder and attain financial independence.
Another project that endeared Nestle to women especially in the Northern parts of Nigeria has been the Nestle’s Nigeria and IFDC/2Scale project Sorghum and Millet. As much as this project not been gender specific its impact on the female gentle cannot be over-emphasized.
Think about a training that has empowered 7905 sorghum farmers and 1069 millet farmers with 22% of them been women – that is the real impact of these initiative. According to Food Business Africa Journal, the intent is to train a massive 30,000 farmers in the sector.
These women in the Northern parts of Nigeria have emerged stronger moving from the shadows of subsistent cultivation that could barely sustain their household to cash crop farming that has made them a light in their community.
Nestlé Nigeria Commercial Manager, Mr Khaled Ramadan addressing participants during an empowerment program of 50 Southwest rural women who benefited from Nestle empowerment project in Oshogbo.
In the words of Hadaza Abdullahi in Bauchi “Now I am sure to make profit in farming not just because I have the right grains but I have been trained on how to plant it, keep it and sell it. In the last 2 years feeding is no longer our problem, we can now wake up everyday to enjoy farming, thank you Nestle”
Without doubt Nestle has made empowering women their priority and has been meeting the UN’s SDG 5 – its goal to ensure women feel supported, valued and respected and this has been the bench mark for this organization. We can only hope and pray for more as the years role by, for me, Nestle has outdone itself in empowering the society through our women and my sentiments are shared by a lot of women across Nigeria.
And just like Sara Blakely’s famous quote of “when you held a woman fulfill her potential, magic happens” readily comes to mind as when see the wonders the society experience when women are economically empowered. The ripple effect of better living standard for the family, higher school enrolment rate, increase in life expectancy among men and reduction in crime rates are some of the advantages that come with women economic empowerment as listed by the International Center for Research for Women (ICWR) in its 2011 publication.