Women’s enterprise experts call for more support for female entrepreneurs
A Merseyside-based women's enterprise agency has joined a UK-wide group of influential women entrepreneurs, academics and policy experts to call on the Government to act urgently to encourage women-owned businesses or risk wasting a multi-million pound opportunity to grow the economy.
The Women’s Enterprise Policy Group believes that women who are capable of starting growth companies that serve global markets may be the nation’s ‘secret weapon’ for achieving sustained economic growth.
It comes as yesterday's figures show female unemployment at its highest level for 23 years with a record level of young people, including many female graduates, without work.
In a newly-published report, The Women’s Enterprise Policy Group says that self-employment and business ownership can be a positive way of addressing these issues as well as helping existing women-owned businesses to take on new employees and contractors.
Maggie O’Carroll, Chief Executive of the largest UK women’s enterprise agency, Liverpool-based The Women’s Organisation and a key member of the policy group said: “At a time when government funding for business support has been cut and when many businesses are struggling to survive and grow, there is a danger that the progress made to date will falter and the multi-billion pound opportunity which growth from female-led enterprises can bring to the economy will not be realised.”
In its report ‘A Multi Million £ Opportunity – The Untapped Growth Potential of UK Women Entrepreneurs’ the group calls for a range of measures including:
• Appointment of a women’s enterprise champion within government to raise awareness of economic benefits of encouraging more women to start and grow businesses
• Investment in business growth programmes for existing female entrepreneurs
• Doubling the number of women entrepreneurs using mentors and/or networking opportunities by promoting activities amongst networking groups
• Assisting local enterprise partnerships and local authorities to develop business support and economic development policies and strategies which optimise women’s enterprise in their localities
• Ensuring current university and further education support is attractive and useful to young women, closing the gap between the numbers of young men and young women starting businesses.
The report comes as the British Conservative MEP Marina Yannakoudakis made a call for more support to enable working mothers and other women to start up or grow their own small businesses. The European Parliament member believes that targeting women with the right information about how to launch a business can help produce a new generation of women entrepreneurs.
The Women’s Enterprise Policy Group report highlights that there are more than 700,000 women-owned businesses operating across the nation in every sector and their role in growing the economy, and creating and sustaining new jobs, is crucial to recovery and growth.
Findings include:
• 14% of all SME (small and medium-sized enterprises) are women-led (around 170,000)
• 86% of women-led SME’s are micro businesses (employing between one and nine staff)
• 13% are ‘small businesses’ (employing between 10 and 49 staff) and 2% are ‘medium’ businesses (employing between 50 and 249)
The findings coincide with additional evidence gathered by the Kauffman Foundation in the United States which provides compelling evidence as to the economic value and opportunity that the female entrepreneurial market offers to the UK economy.
The report will be highlighted by The Women’s Organisation when it as it led women’s enterprise strand at the 2012 Global Entrepreneurship Congress in Liverpool in March.
The Women’s Organisation, based with a new £5.5m Women’s International Centre for Economic Development in Liverpool, provides a range of services focused on women’s start-up businesses and small and medium-sized enterprises. This includes ’incubation’ units for new and high growth women enterprises and an international research and knowledge centre focused on women’s enterprise and wider economic development issues.
To find out more about the free services available from The Women’s Organisation, including advice and support on starting a business, call 0151 706 8111.
Alternatively please email info@thewo.org.uk or visit www.thewomensorganisation.org.uk
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