WEE Hub Newsletter (Vol.1, Issue 03, Aug 2023)

Abstract

Welcome to Volume 1, Issue 3 of the UoN WEE Hub Newsletter. The WEE Hub is committed, through research on entrepreneurship and employment to generate data that supports continuous evidence-based development of knowledge in the area of employment creation that informs policy decisions by policy makers and interventions by stakeholders. To this end, the African Women Studies Centre (AWSC) UoN WEE Hub has published two reports in this area.

The first one being Women in the Labour Force in Kenya: A Focus on Employment and Entrepreneurship and the second one which was done in collaboration with the Kenya National Treasury was Assessing what Works for Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) in the Implementation of Kenya’s Credit Guarantee Scheme http://erepository.uonbi.ac.ke/ handle/11295/163759.

On the other hand, the impact of our Incubation Project continues to grow as we carry on with data collection and analysis as part of the project monitoring process.

The research evidence illuminates what works for women’s economic empowerment and is utilized by policy makers and other stakeholders in decision making and project interventions. Our African Women’s Incubation model continues to shed light on the challenges women in Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) face as individual women entrepreneurs as well as for women’s collectives business.

Many actors have ventured into this sector because of the recognition by the Government and other stakeholders that growing the sector offers a solution to mitigating unemployment and poverty as well as growing the economy.

According to the Kenya Institute of Public Policy Research and Analysis (KIPPRA), MSMEs contribute to over 90% of the total labour force in Kenya, thus contributing to the reduction of poverty and positively influencing economic growth. The Report indicates that the MSMEs employ over 14.9 million Kenyans in various sectors of the economy, hence the need to rethink the concept of employment.