Publication: What Works in Supporting Women-led Businesses?
Loading...
Other Files
146 downloads
123 downloads
156 downloads
Date
2023-01
ISSN
Published
2023-01
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
The narrative among policymakers about women’s entrepreneurship is slowly shifting from encouraging the creation of a high number of startups to focusing on supporting women who are well positioned to lead growth-oriented enterprises. Innovative women entrepreneurs can be agents of change and provide new solutions to global challenges, yet they face multiple barriers to growing their businesses. This policy brief examines the following four areas of constraints and provides evidence on measures to reduce gender gaps in each: 1. Human capital, including gender gaps in access to skills and networks 2. Factors constraining access to finance 3. Factors constraining technology uptake and market expansion, and 4. Contextual factors, including legal and regulatory constraints, social norms, access to care, and gender-based violence.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“Ubfal, Diego Javier. 2023. What Works in Supporting Women-led Businesses?. © World Bank Group. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/38564 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication What Works in Supporting Women-Led Businesses ?(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-04-03)Innovative women entrepreneurs can be agents of change and offer novel solutions to global challenges. However, they face multiple barriers to growing their businesses. This paper reviews the literature on strategies to support women entrepreneurs in improving their business outcomes. It focuses on interventions designed to address four areas of constraints that influence their decisions and can impact their business performance: gaps in human capital, access to finance, access to technology and markets, and contextual factors such as legal and regulatory constraints, social norms, access to care, and gender-based violence. The review concludes that evidence of modest average treatment effects and heterogeneity in treatment effects across various interventions suggest the need for more precise targeting. The multiple constraints faced by women entrepreneurs necessitates testing different packages of interventions. Moreover, the successful implementation and adoption of proposed solutions require consideration of the contextual constraints that differentially affect women-led businesses. While the review highlights several interventions that show promise in supporting women entrepreneurs, significant gaps remain in the evidence concerning the most effective strategies.Publication Promoting Women's Economic Empowerment : What Works?(World Bank Group, Washington, DC, 2014-11)A review of rigorous evaluations of interventions that seek to empower women economically shows that the same class of interventions has significantly different outcomes depending on the client. Capital alone, as a small cash loan or grant, is not sufficient to grow women-owned subsistence-level firms. However, it can work if it is delivered in-kind to more successful women microentrepreneurs, and it should boost the performance of women's larger-sized SMEs. Very poor women need a more intensive package of services than do less poor women to break out of subsistence production and grow their businesses. What works for young women does not necessarily work for adult women. Skills training, job search assistance, internships, and wage subsidies increase the employment levels of adult women but do not raise wages. However, similar interventions increase young women's employability and earnings if social restrictions are not binding. Women who run subsistence-level firms face additional social constraints when compared to similar men, thus explaining the differences in the outcomes of some loans, grants, and training interventions that favor men. Social constraints may also play a role in explaining women's outcome gains that are short-lasting or emerge with a delay. The good news is that many of the additional constraints that women face can be overcome by simple, inexpensive adjustments in program design that lessen family and social pressures. These include providing capital in-kind or transacted through the privacy of a mobile phone and providing secure savings accounts to nudge women to keep the money in the business rather than to divert it to non-business uses.Publication Growing Women-led Enterprises in the Mekong : Testing a Methodology for Accelerating Growth(Washington, DC, 2014)According to a recent global entrepreneurship monitor, 48 percent of entrepreneurs globally are women. Growth-oriented women entrepreneurs face challenges such as lack of access to support services and relevant knowledge as well as regulatory and legal barriers. Recognizing the barriers that often prevent women from growing their businesses, infoDev embarked on a small pilot project designed to test a new methodology for increasing the capacity, confidence, and networks of growth-oriented women leading small businesses. The objective was to test whether this methodology will indeed lead to business expansion. infoDevapos;s pilot - the Mekong womenapos;s entrepreneurship challenge (MWEC) - set out to test a methodology based primarily on structured facilitation of peer-to-peer learning among growth-oriented women entrepreneurs. This report discusses the design, outcomes, and lessons of MWEC in further detail and provides a few preliminary recommendations for the design of future programs targeting the growth of women-owned enterprises.Publication Increasing the Participation of Women Entrepreneurs in the Solomon Islands Aid Economy(Washington, DC, 2011)International aid flows are equivalent to almost half of Solomon Islands' economy, making it one of the most aid-dependent countries in the world. Around US$250 million of non-military aid enters the country, but only 15-20 percent of this amount is spent locally through local procurement or staff expenditure. Solomon Islands are currently highly reliant on logging for export receipts, Government revenues, and employment. But existing stocks of natural forest logs are expected to be entirely exhausted by 2014. The Solomon Islands Government approached the World Bank Group to identify alternative sources of revenue, foreign exchange receipts, and employment in the absence of logging. In responding to this request, the World Bank Group has undertaken extensive analytical work examining short and medium-term prospects for economic growth in Solomon Islands, under the sources of growth project. This report contributes to the sources of growth work, and is informed by its findings. A key conclusion arising from sources of growth analysis is that aid is likely to remain a key part of the Solomon Islands economy for the near future. The existence of an international security guarantee, backed by the presence of an international peacekeeping force, is paramount for security, and investment certainty. In the absence of clear or certain alternatives to logging, and in the context of rapid population growth, current levels of service delivery will continue to depend on high levels of aid expenditure.Publication Policy Lessons on Supporting Women Entrepreneurs(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2023-01-25)Entrepreneurship can be a pathway to employment and economic empowerment for women. Over half of the women in developing countries are or aspire to be entrepreneurs, but most of them run subsistence oriented micro-businesses that are not seen as key drivers of innovation and growth. Among formal firms, the share of women-led businesses decreases as the size of the firm increases. Multiple factors—including lack of skills, networks, and access to finance, technology, and markets—constrain women’s decision to become entrepreneurs and affect their choices concerning which sector to enter, how much to put into their firms, and which business practices and technology to adopt. Contextual factors, such as social norms, access to childcare, and risk of gender-based violence, also contribute to the gender gap in firm performance documented by the Africa GIL3 and the EAP GIL. The GIL Federation is generating rigorous evidence around the world to understand what works, and what does not, in addressing the differential constraints restricting the growth of women-led firms. This note presents evidence on five key findings.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication World Development Report 2004(World Bank, 2003)Too often, services fail poor people in access, in quality, and in affordability. But the fact that there are striking examples where basic services such as water, sanitation, health, education, and electricity do work for poor people means that governments and citizens can do a better job of providing them. Learning from success and understanding the sources of failure, this year’s World Development Report, argues that services can be improved by putting poor people at the center of service provision. How? By enabling the poor to monitor and discipline service providers, by amplifying their voice in policymaking, and by strengthening the incentives for providers to serve the poor. Freedom from illness and freedom from illiteracy are two of the most important ways poor people can escape from poverty. To achieve these goals, economic growth and financial resources are of course necessary, but they are not enough. The World Development Report provides a practical framework for making the services that contribute to human development work for poor people. With this framework, citizens, governments, and donors can take action and accelerate progress toward the common objective of poverty reduction, as specified in the Millennium Development Goals.Publication Digital Progress and Trends Report 2023(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-03-05)Digitalization is the transformational opportunity of our time. The digital sector has become a powerhouse of innovation, economic growth, and job creation. Value added in the IT services sector grew at 8 percent annually during 2000–22, nearly twice as fast as the global economy. Employment growth in IT services reached 7 percent annually, six times higher than total employment growth. The diffusion and adoption of digital technologies are just as critical as their invention. Digital uptake has accelerated since the COVID-19 pandemic, with 1.5 billion new internet users added from 2018 to 2022. The share of firms investing in digital solutions around the world has more than doubled from 2020 to 2022. Low-income countries, vulnerable populations, and small firms, however, have been falling behind, while transformative digital innovations such as artificial intelligence (AI) have been accelerating in higher-income countries. Although more than 90 percent of the population in high-income countries was online in 2022, only one in four people in low-income countries used the internet, and the speed of their connection was typically only a small fraction of that in wealthier countries. As businesses in technologically advanced countries integrate generative AI into their products and services, less than half of the businesses in many low- and middle-income countries have an internet connection. The growing digital divide is exacerbating the poverty and productivity gaps between richer and poorer economies. The Digital Progress and Trends Report series will track global digitalization progress and highlight policy trends, debates, and implications for low- and middle-income countries. The series adds to the global efforts to study the progress and trends of digitalization in two main ways: · By compiling, curating, and analyzing data from diverse sources to present a comprehensive picture of digitalization in low- and middle-income countries, including in-depth analyses on understudied topics. · By developing insights on policy opportunities, challenges, and debates and reflecting the perspectives of various stakeholders and the World Bank’s operational experiences. This report, the first in the series, aims to inform evidence-based policy making and motivate action among internal and external audiences and stakeholders. The report will bring global attention to high-performing countries that have valuable experience to share as well as to areas where efforts will need to be redoubled.Publication Global Economic Prospects, June 2025(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-06-10)The global economy is facing another substantial headwind, emanating largely from an increase in trade tensions and heightened global policy uncertainty. For emerging market and developing economies (EMDEs), the ability to boost job creation and reduce extreme poverty has declined. Key downside risks include a further escalation of trade barriers and continued policy uncertainty. These challenges are exacerbated by subdued foreign direct investment into EMDEs. Global cooperation is needed to restore a more stable international trade environment and scale up support for vulnerable countries grappling with conflict, debt burdens, and climate change. Domestic policy action is also critical to contain inflation risks and strengthen fiscal resilience. To accelerate job creation and long-term growth, structural reforms must focus on raising institutional quality, attracting private investment, and strengthening human capital and labor markets. Countries in fragile and conflict situations face daunting development challenges that will require tailored domestic policy reforms and well-coordinated multilateral support.Publication The Container Port Performance Index 2023(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-07-18)The Container Port Performance Index (CPPI) measures the time container ships spend in port, making it an important point of reference for stakeholders in the global economy. These stakeholders include port authorities and operators, national governments, supranational organizations, development agencies, and other public and private players in trade and logistics. The index highlights where vessel time in container ports could be improved. Streamlining these processes would benefit all parties involved, including shipping lines, national governments, and consumers. This fourth edition of the CPPI relies on data from 405 container ports with at least 24 container ship port calls in the calendar year 2023. As in earlier editions of the CPPI, the ranking employs two different methodological approaches: an administrative (technical) approach and a statistical approach (using matrix factorization). Combining these two approaches ensures that the overall ranking of container ports reflects actual port performance as closely as possible while also being statistically robust. The CPPI methodology assesses the sequential steps of a container ship port call. ‘Total port hours’ refers to the total time elapsed from the moment a ship arrives at the port until the vessel leaves the berth after completing its cargo operations. The CPPI uses time as an indicator because time is very important to shipping lines, ports, and the entire logistics chain. However, time, as captured by the CPPI, is not the only way to measure port efficiency, so it does not tell the entire story of a port’s performance. Factors that can influence the time vessels spend in ports can be location-specific and under the port’s control (endogenous) or external and beyond the control of the port (exogenous). The CPPI measures time spent in container ports, strictly based on quantitative data only, which do not reveal the underlying factors or root causes of extended port times. A detailed port-specific diagnostic would be required to assess the contribution of underlying factors to the time a vessel spends in port. A very low ranking or a significant change in ranking may warrant special attention, for which the World Bank generally recommends a detailed diagnostic.Publication Global Economic Prospects, January 2025(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-01-16)Global growth is expected to hold steady at 2.7 percent in 2025-26. However, the global economy appears to be settling at a low growth rate that will be insufficient to foster sustained economic development—with the possibility of further headwinds from heightened policy uncertainty and adverse trade policy shifts, geopolitical tensions, persistent inflation, and climate-related natural disasters. Against this backdrop, emerging market and developing economies are set to enter the second quarter of the twenty-first century with per capita incomes on a trajectory that implies substantially slower catch-up toward advanced-economy living standards than they previously experienced. Without course corrections, most low-income countries are unlikely to graduate to middle-income status by the middle of the century. Policy action at both global and national levels is needed to foster a more favorable external environment, enhance macroeconomic stability, reduce structural constraints, address the effects of climate change, and thus accelerate long-term growth and development.