THE Embassy of Ireland in partnership with Hivos and the Institute of Young Women Development (IYWD) has embarked on a women empowerment drive to support female-led start-ups in Zimbabwe’s remote areas.
The project has supported projects for women who are farm workers, victims of gender-based violence, early child marriages in rural areas and female councillors.
Speaking during a recent workshop on the project, Hivos Women Empowerment Project manager Tambudzai Madzimure said the organisations had provided training, financial support and capacity building to support several rural communities in Zimbabwe.
“We are supporting rural communities in women leadership training. That is actually supporting young women community members from their various communities. Why are we investing in that area? Because come the next general council, they need to vote, people leaning toward the national structures, are coming from these young women,” she said.
“Women need to be involved in some of the decision-making processes and be able to stand for themselves and come up with broader solutions to their challenges. We are also supporting young women on different start-up projects, where some are making detergents, are into animal husbandry, small businesses and agriculture.
“We are working towards the idea of making sure that they have enough demand for the products and the things that they are doing.”
Madzimure added that the project was also helping the women financially and was also doing capacity-building training for the female entrepreneurs.
“We visit the partners and we exchange ideas and ask where they are having challenges, see what we can address. We have seen that it is one of the major challenges, especially for women in the rural communities and that is what we have come to do,” she said.
“We have then also extended our reach in our other project, where we are reaching out to Parliament where possible, to draw in Parliament and bring them in focus with what we are doing, the challenges we are facing and just bring to notice some of the gaps that need to be addressed. Some of the issues that come out of our platforms, we then also share with them at that level.”
The Ireland embassy’s deputy head of mission, Vicky Dillion, applauded the work that had been done by Hivos and IYWD, urging them to continue looking for bigger opportunities for economic development anchored by women empowerment.
“I think gender equality and women’s rights and advancing gender equality were a really important part of Ireland’s journey, our own journey in economic growth and towards prosperity. It was a very difficult year in Zimbabwe and we have been following the situation with the recent drought very closely,” she said.
“We, with the European Union, are contributing to the humanitarian aid to help with the drought response and investment in agriculture.
“So, I think as we move forward, we need to think on opportunities and discuss some of these bigger investments. I think also an opportunity Ireland is going to be leading the development cooperation segment of the consultations with the government.”
Dillion said big things key areas prioritising was gender equality and women empowerment.
She noted that she was going to present some of the developments of the project to government for their continued support.