Women in St. Lucia will benefit from a social protection project, funded by Global Affairs Canada, that will boost women’s economic resilience by tackling the barriers that exacerbate their vulnerabilities to achieving economic empowerment. Co-led by UN Women and UNFPA, in partnership with the Government of St. Lucia, the Build Back Equal project was launched today at the Bay Gardens Inn to provide sustainable opportunities for women’s economic growth that will contribute to COVID-19 recovery.

Ten women entrepreneurs in the agribusiness sector in Jamaica received stipends valued at $100,000 Jamaica Dollars to scale their businesses under the Women’s Entrepreneurship Support (WES) Project. The stipends were financed through the Enabling Gender-Responsive Disaster Recovery, Climate and Environmental Resilience in the Caribbean (EnGenDER) Project, a project funded by the Government of Canada and UK FCDO, which is UNDP-led with co-implementation by UN Women, WFP and CDEMA.

“COVID-19 brought about virtual change and we were not ready…the training helped us to make the change.” ~Training Participant. In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and its pervasive socio-economic impacts, women across the Caribbean have had to find innovative ways to continue to generate income to provide for themselves, their families, and their communities. Thanks to a United Nations Trust Fund for Human Security (UNTFHS)supported training programme, entitled: &ldquo...

Investments with a gender lens are important but they alone are not enough. Often times, financial institutions put credit lines in place, but they come and go. What is needed is business support advisory, and evidence.