A mechanism for economic development and empowerment

Latin America and the Caribbean has one of the highest rates of female entrepreneurship in the world. However, female entrepreneurs face higher barriers than their male counterparts due to: the difficulty of getting access to networks and markets for their products, the difficulty of getting access to training and services for business development, lack of familiarity with commercial credit facilities (which leads to greater risk aversion and a dependence on informal sources of financing), lower-value assets (which gives rise to higher collateral requirements), and their primary role in household care. Additionally, women entrepreneurs are concentrated mainly in micro and small enterprises in sectors such as trade, services, and manufacturing and they have low representation in high-productivity sectors or STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics). How can we move forward on this agenda? Use our GDLab investigations search tool to learn more.