Trade and gender
Developing women’s entrepreneurship and e-business in green cooperatives in the Asian and Pacific region.
Promoting women’s entrepreneurship and e-business development
Authors:
; UNESCAP
Publisher:
United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific , 2007
This document explores the potential for women in entrepreneurship and e-business in the niche area of green or “organic” cooperatives. It seeks to promote women’s entrepreneurship and e-business development by providing policymakers and entrepreneurs with background on this niche area, potential entrepreneurship and e-business development opportunities, and a discussion of its implications for rural development.
The authors argue that entrepreneurship in organic/green produce provides new opportunities to farmers in developing countries, especially women smallholders. At the same time, many Asian developing countries possess strong market potential for producing specialty, value-added products that sustain the agro-ecological environment. The green cooperative model of enterprise enables smallholders to capitalise on these potentials by supporting the identification of specialty produce and its marketing opportunities, providing financial and business related services
A number of policy recommendations are made to promote women’s entrepreneurship and e-business development in the agricultural sector including:
- use of a certification system and marketing: to raise consumers’ trust, governments should adopt a certification system for green products
- capacity-building training: donor agencies and other external actors need to focus their resources on raising the capacity for women’s cooperative participation in the new direction of agricultural development
- establishment of intraregional e-business women’s green cooperatives networks- to widen export market opportunities, it is important for women’s green cooperatives in the region to form entrepreneurial support networks and, where possible, e-business networks using new information technologies
- elimination of gendered constraints in women’s entrepreneurship- under gender-constrained conditions, it is important that governments introduce measures to eliminate discriminatory practices against women’s entrepreneurship
- conducive polices and strategies that address gender imbalance must be in place, prioritising and enabling gender equity not only in access and use but in the derived benefits and opportunities.
