The Nelson Mandela Bay Business Chamber joins hands with the rest of South Africa today as it commemorates National Women’s Day, a moment to reflect on women and their contribution beyond the attainment of democracy. Gender equality and women empowerment remain one of the key cogs in the country’s national debate to embrace the role of women in driving inclusive positive change and impact in all socio-economic spheres of our country, says Chamber chief executive, Denise van Huyssteen.
This year’s commemoration focuses on the United Nation’s theme for the day – “Digit4ALL: Innovation and technology for gender equality” – and is a priority theme for the upcoming 67th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW – 67), “Innovation and technological change, and education in the digital age for achieving gender equality”.
On August 9, 1956, over 20 000 women of all races marched to the Union Buildings in Pretoria to protest against the Urban Areas Act of 1950 amendments. This law required all South Africans defined as “black” to carry an internal passport that served to maintain segregation, control urbanisation and manage migrant labour pre democracy.
Over the years, women have redefined their roles within societies by taking up space in predominantly male dominated industries both at operational and strategic levels. “Unfortunately the country has not advanced as rapidly in terms of socio-economic empowerment and gender equality as it should, and women remain the hardest hit by inequality, poverty and unemployment,” says Van Huyssteen.
“It is vital that both males and females who occupy key leadership positions take bold and decisive steps to eliminate inequalities. Ultimately, through the adoption of a more gender inclusive approach, critical socio-economic outcomes are more likely to be achieved. As such, more focus should be given to strengthening programmes that are women targeted for socio-economic empowerment and to give women more responsibility so as to play a central role in building the economy and a strong nation through unrestricted labour market participation.”
Van Huyssteen says economically strengthening women, who account for a large percent of the country’s population, is not only a means by which to spur economic growth, but is also a matter of advancing gender equality and greater diversity in the workplace. She further highlights that without proper investment in women’s education, South Africa’s ability to “harness demographic dividend is significantly impaired”.
In 2020, the South African Cabinet adopted a Gender Responsive Planning, Budgeting, Monitoring, Evaluation and Auditing framework. The framework seeks to ensure that planning instruments at a national, sub-national, sectoral, institutional and programme level are gender responsive and that sufficient resources are allocated to interventions which contribute to women’s empowerment and gender equality.
Despite these dynamics, the progress has been slow, steady, and often regressing at times. Senior women representation in the South African corporate environment is currently 36.5%, with a marginal rise from 35.2% in 2021 and 35.1% in 2020 (World Bank, Gender Data Portal, 2022).
In 2022, only 8% of the JSE listed businesses in SA have a woman as a CEO (PWC, 2022).
“What South Africa needs right now is less lip service or blaming games, but more focus on implementing these women targeted programmes to help steer the country into a more prosperous growth path, with women taking a leading role,” she says.
As a catalyst for economic development in the Metro, the Chamber runs a number of highly successful programmes such as the Empowerment Network, a platform sponsored by FNB and designed to facilitate networking, connections, partnerships, mentorship and support opportunities for businesses and professionals in Nelson Mandela Bay and consists of the Women Empowerment Connect and Mentorship Networks.
During 2022, the Network hosted 8 Women Empowerment workshops which attracted over 100 women per event and enrolled 29 mentees with an additional 15 in 2023. The Chamber further has a an Entrepreneurship Desk which was launched in April 2022 and has now surpassed the 200 mark of qualifying small, medium and micro enterprises (SMMEs) that have been registered.
The Desk currently has 220 registered businesses of which 51% are women-owned and 65% black-owned, and have a combined annual turnover of over R200 million between them, employing over 1000 people. The group has already gained much-needed business knowledge and skills, advisory support and networking opportunities through their participation in this platform.
Sponsored by Borbet SA and Standard Bank, the Desk acts as a single platform where business support, growth and sustainability initiatives are housed. This support, growth and sustainability, is achieved through four pillars namely access to funding and professional banking advice, access to entrepreneurial and business skills development, access to one on one advisory support, and market access opportunities.
Importantly, there are a number of women from local businesses, representing various sectors of the economy, who are active participants in the Chamber’s clusters, task teams and Board Committees.