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Why 2021 MasterCard Index of Women Entrepreneurs holds promise for Africa — President, Harvest Foundation 

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The MasterCard Index of Women Entrepreneurs (MIWE)2021 report, released at the end of March, 2022, has continued to attract reviews from key institutions within the African continent.

The latest of such reactions emerged Tuesday, as the President, Harvest Foundation, Mrs Adaoha Ugo-Ngadi, spoke against the backdrop of MIWE 2021 report which highlighted 13 best African countries for women entrepreneurs.

In the 118-page report, Botswana, South Africa, Ghana, Madagascar, Uganda, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Angola, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria, Malawi and Egypt were named as top destinations for people seeking a safe haven for women entrepreneurs in Africa.

MIWE 2021 involved a survey of 65 countries, and Botswana at 35 was Africa’s best performing country. The top positions, expectedly, were occupied by entities from North America, West and Eastern Europe, and Asia.

According to MasterCard, its sample size of 65 economies represents 82.4% of the world’s female labour force.

Speaking to the report on Tuesday, Mrs Ugo-Ngadi said that though the revelations showed a comparatively weak performance by African economies, they should be regarded as a challenge to managers of the continent’s economies.

“The MIWE report is, no doubt, an incisive and compelling read. Africa’s best performance standing at 35 out of 65 indicates that a lot more work needs to be done to redress the narrative.

“The reason for this weak performance is not far-fetched. African governments are more guilty of United Nations findings which note that only 10% of all policy measures put in place globally are gender sensitive and are geared towards addressing women’s needs,”Ugo-Ngadi noted in a statement.

The release added: “Reworking the African narrative must be deliberate and well thought out. African leaders, from Cape to Cairo, must open up themselves to fresh understanding of where the global economy is headed. The reality is that across the entrepreneurial landscape, women have become one of the essential elements defining the global economy’s most valuable assets.

“African leaders must come to a realization that African women entrepreneurs hold the key to a regeneration of the continent’s economy, and this is why the Harvest Foundation has committed to piloting the first-ever African Woman International Trade Fair.

Ugo-Ngadi also called for the urgent removal of the barriers stopping African women from reaching their full potential saying, “Women have the numbers. There is an immediate need to factor that into policy making if African female entrepreneurs hope to increasingly occupy an improved place in the 37% accounting for global GDP.”

 

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Kenya: Parliament approves appointment of Kamau Thugge as central bank governor

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Months after throwing open the position for the country’s top banker, Kenya’s parliament has approved the appointment of Kamau Thugge as the country’s central bank governor.

The National Assembly on Wednesday approved the
appointment of economist and senior civil servant who was nominated by President William Ruto as the next apex bank chief.

Thugge, who served as principal secretary in the finance ministry until mid-2018, was nominated after serving as one of the president’s senior economic advisers since late last year.

He shook off competition from others shortlisted candidates like Adan Mohamed, who served in the cabinet from 2013-2022, with four others also interviewed for the role.

The new central bank governor will be faced with the immediate pressure of stabilizing the country’s monetary policy as the East African giant currently faces a shortage of funds amidst rising public debt.

Despite the odds, the World Bank in a report earlier today expects growth to edge up to 5.0% in 2023, underpinned by a recovery in agriculture.

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Ghana presents ‘working proposal’ for debt restructuring— IMF sources

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West African country, Ghana has made a major move at resolving its debt crisis as the country has presented debt restructuring proposal to its creditors.

According to sources quoted by Reuters, a “working proposal” has been submitted to help the country escape its worst economic crisis in a generation.

One of the sources revealed that the proposal was a first attempt to engage the official creditor committee after its formation in May. It should be recalled that the Paris Club last month announced that official sector of creditors of Ghana had formed a committee co-chaired by China and France for debt restructuring talks.

The plan is to end restructuring of domestic debt before turning to negotiations with its official bilateral creditors and international bondholders, a government official said.

Ghana is one of several cash-strapped countries facing unprecedented delays in getting bailouts as China, its biggest bilateral creditor with about $1.7 billion of debt and Western economies disagree over how debt relief should be structured.

The first formal review of the programme will hold in the coming months as an IMF team will visit Ghana between 8th and 15th of June.

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