Minister of Women’s Affairs Community Small and Medium Enterprise Development, Sithembiso Nyoni has expressed concern over the shortage of proper marketing places and platforms for women run enterprises, demanding that local authorities promote orderly operation of businesses in the country.
Addressing the media last week, Nyoni said government has supported women run businesses through availing funds but bemoaned the lack of markets to sustain the various initiated projects.
“Women in the country have had an opportunity to start life sustaining projects in the horticultural, food production and cross boarder trading sectors but markets have emerged to be a challenge as they struggle to secure market spaces and other regional trading platforms,” said Nyoni.
She said despite the many challenges facing women, government has taken itself to task to ensure that local authorities in all the ten provinces provide women with proper selling space.
“Work space has been a challenge for many women in their business growth and in the same vein, quality of goods is compromised whilst affecting their visibility to attract potential and serious buyers, working space has now become a priority which is why as a ministry we will conduct meeting with stakeholders of the local authorities, and inter-ministerial committees to discuss land provision and amenities that should be put in place to allow smooth flow and orderly operation of businesses in the country,” she said.
Nyoni added that women’s businesses have grown in numbers over the years and recently Manicaland women have showed a huge progress in their day to day business activities.
“I have been to several provinces observing how women in business are doing, they are performing extremely well, most women have few challenges in accessing funding but they mainly face challenges in marketing and exporting and despite the country having made significant strides in emancipating women, there are still some challenges in accessing markets,” said Nyoni.
