Thus, women's empowerment can accelerate the economic growth of a country.
"Not only in economic growth, but women's empowerment is also a multiplier factor in reducing poverty, increasing food security, nutritional improvement, and improving the governance of a country," he said at the 1st International Conference on Women & Sharia Community Empowerment, which was followed online from here on Thursday.
Women have a dominant role in the micro, small, and medium enterprise (MSME) sector, he noted. Of the 65.5 million MSMEs in Indonesia, around 65 percent are owned by women. The majority of the women-owned MSMEs are running food and clothing businesses.
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Various surveys have also reported that women-owned MSMEs have shown more resilience than MSMEs owned by men during the pandemic. For example, the number of women-owned MSMEs that closed their business during the pandemic has been lower compared to men-owned MSMEs.
Nevertheless, he said that women-owned MSMEs are still facing many challenges and hindrances in terms of capacity, production, institutions, supporting ecosystem, as well as financing or capital.
For example, in the production aspect, MSMEs still face hindrances in terms of the standardization of quality and continuity of production. Meanwhile, to encourage MSMEs to scale up, the aspects of quality and continuity need to be considered. Then, in the financing aspect, only 22 percent of MSMEs have access to financing sources, including banking.
"Therefore, this is one of the factors where policy intervention, both from BI and from various relevant ministries such as the Ministry of Cooperatives and SMEs as well as the Ministry of Finance, is highly crucial," he remarked.
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Translator: Agatha Olivia, Raka Adji
Editor: Suharto
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