World Bank vows to empower hundreds of millions of women by 2030

The World Bank has set out ambitious targets to boost economic opportunities for women and improve their welfare by 2030, pledging to help hundreds of millions of women in the developing world.

Ajay Banga, the Bank’s president, unveiled on Thursday three goals that serve one pillar of its Gender Strategy 2030: expanding and enabling women’s participation in the economy.

The Bank will enable 300m more women to use broadband, support 250m poor and vulnerable women with social protection programmes and provide capital to 80m women entrepreneurs.

The present gap between the economic participation of women and men costs the global economy trillions of dollars, as new research has shown this week.

Speaking at the launch, Sandra Ablamba Johnson, minister general secretary at the presidency of Togo, said increasing investment in women was the best way to meet development goals. “There is no way that we can achieve sustainable development without involving women,” she said.

Banga said his own experience in his previous jobs at Citibank and MasterCard had taught him that when the “lady of the house” was given social and economic power, she transformed her family fortunes forever. “The multiplier effect is to not only transform her life but that of those around her [and] is why I believe that unlocking the potential of this dormant opportunity is enormous for our future.”

To achieve its broadband target, the Bank will prioritise investments in countries with the worst connectivity gaps, emphasising gender equality, and advocate for policy reforms to facilitate private investment.

On social protection, it will invest in digital social registries so women can receive support, especially through direct digital cash transfers.

And the Bank will work with regulators and financial players to remove gender biases against businesswomen raising capital and help raise capital through gender bonds and other instruments.

“One very simple thing I’ve seen all my years [is] if a woman starts a business, she tends to employ a lot of them,” said Banga.

Progress so far has been disappointing. According to the World Economic Forum, there is a global funding shortfall of $1.7tr for micro, small and medium sized enterprises run by women. “This is why this is not just the right thing to do, it’s also the smart thing to do,” Banga said. He added that Bank research had found if women were employed at the same rate as men, income per capita could grow by almost 20% over the long term.

The picture is particularly bleak in Asia. In an interview with GlobalMarkets, the Bank’s chief South Asia economist Franziska Ohnsorge said only 32% of working age women in the region were in the labour force last year, well below the male rate of 77% and an average for women across emerging markets and developing economies of 54%.

Modelling by her team showed that if as many women worked as men, the region’s output could be anywhere between 13% and 51% higher. In calculations carried out for GlobalMarkets, Ohnsorge said closing the gap would translate into an aggregate increase in GDP of between $581bn and $2.3tr, or between $300 and $1,177 per capita.

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