Women's Affairs Program
The COIF Women’s Affairs program aligns with the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goal #5 (UN SDG5), - Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment – to “achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls”, and African Union (AU) Agenda 2063 Goals# 4 & 17 – “Transformed Economies” and “full Gender Equality in All Spheres of Life”.
Since the program is expected to empower women to break free from poverty, one of its primary focus will include economically equipping the participants to provide basic needs such as; food, shelter, education and healthcare for themselves and their families. The support provided to the women will include participation in a support group based on the “Chama” model.
The program is a 15-month long journey which seeks to train, equip and coach candidates through startup and/or scale up of a small business. The women graduates are expected to maintain a sustainable and profitable small business and also serve as active members of a Women’s Chama to facilitate savings and borrowing for future growth.
Additionally, the program is geared towards closing the achievement, entrepreneurial, opportunity and skills gaps by empowering and impacting women financially and economically thereby boosting their standards of living.
Training women in colleges, technical schools and communities to enable them to have a better chance of success and sustainability in self employment.
Investing in women's economic well-being in entrepreneurship through micro-savings and micro-lending.
Prepare, groom and equip women with potential businesses for trade in the global market through existing target programs geared for women entrepreneurs.
Focus on training and educating women on building basic business skills that creates a bench strength of a strong business foundation.