WCIC rolls out study to identify issues in increasing participation of women in economy

• Aims to shed light on ground reality of challenges in participating in economic activities
• Findings reveal participation of women in business is small despite high education levels
• Lack of awareness of LSI projects together with social barriers faced by female entrepreneurs caused an overall “sense of resistance”

In an effort to increase the participation of women in the national economy and explore the avenues to improve their contribution to the development of the country, the Women’s Chamber of Industry and Commerce (WCIC) rolled out a study to shed light on the ground reality.

The WCIC engaged in a pilot project initiated by the Centre for International Private Enterprise (CIPE) to explore how large-scale infrastructure projects are conducted in Sri Lanka. The objective was to understand the processes, process efficiency, transparency and accountability.

The WCIC said that as the body focuses on enhancing the participation of women entrepreneurs for greater economic contribution, it embarked on this project primarily to identify the opportunities for women in such spaces.
“We were keen to explore the current levels of awareness among them related to such projects and if they had any experience in engaging with them. In the case where no previous experience was sighted, we tried to understand the perceived barriers and how to overcome them.

As an organisation, the WCIC was keen to explore if there was an opportunity for us to support them to build capacity for greater engagement,” said the chamber in a statement to the media.

The study was conducted by KANTAR SL, as a qualitative study among women entrepreneurs. The entrepreneurs represented several sectors, a mix of small, medium and large businesses and entrepreneurs with varying business experience.

The WCIC undertook two projects, one in the education sector and the other in the health sector.
The findings of the study revealed that in the health sector, project tender board participation of women was 40-50 percent and at operational level, the participation was also at a higher level. 

The study also showed that the participation of women in business is small, even though gender representation of the population is higher and women possess higher educational levels.

However, despite the high ratings for education, the participation of women as entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka is low, with only 25 percent of the business owners being women. The study found that a lack of awareness of LSI projects together with social barriers faced by female entrepreneurs caused an overall “sense of resistance”, the WCIC said.    The chamber asserted that the need for better resources, motivation and guidance are key to driving participation.