Ecobank in partnership with Care Zimbabwe yesterday handed over money worth US$35 000 to women in Buhera aimed at promoting financial inclusion and literacy among women and young girls.
The money, which will sponsor the She Leeds in Crisis project, was handed over to the beneficiaries during the annual commemorations of the Ecobank Day at Murambinda growth point.
Several women drawn from across Buhera will benefit from the project that also saw the beneficiaries being equipped with financial skills, including record and book keeping.
Ecobank transactional service group head Michael Dengwani said his bank was working in partnership with UN Women and Care International Zimbabwe in raising financial literacy and inclusion in local communities.
“The Reserve Bank if Zimbabwe and the Ministry of Finance launched the Financial Inclusion Strategy 2, which will run from this year to 2026 and our theme this year as Ecobank is ‘Financial inclusion for women and the youths’ whereby we want to make sure that even the vulnerable communities have access to banking services,” Dengwani said.
“We want to help in terms or wealth creation and poverty eradication, which is why we have come all the way from Harare to team up with Care International and assist these women who are engaged in many projects.”
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Dengwani said they would want to capacitate women and girls by giving them access to various forms of accounts as well as give them capital to start or leverage their businesses.
Care Zimbabwe country director Patric Sikana said: “Our main focus is on women and girls, but we include the communities as well because women and girls do not live alone, so the family is our entry point.”
"We help women and girls gain the skills they need and build their assets.
“This is our very first partnership with Ecobank and it is exciting, however in this country we have been partnering on women’s inclusion for 30 years.”
Beneficiaries they would use the money to start up climate resistant projects.
“We are happy that Ecobank came through and hopefully this donation will help us grow our project of raring goats since we have not been getting much from our fields due to floods or droughts,” said Loveness Mubata.
“I came from Ndongo close to Nyashanu Mission and in our goat keeping project we are 24 and we will use this money to buy a goat for each member, which we will breed and sell.”
The Ecobank Day was initiated in 2013 with the aim of making meaningful contributions to the development of communities.