{"id":73208,"date":"2025-08-14T14:49:53","date_gmt":"2025-08-14T14:49:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=73208"},"modified":"2025-08-14T14:49:53","modified_gmt":"2025-08-14T14:49:53","slug":"wto-launches-50-million-fund-for-women-in-digital-trade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2025\/08\/14\/wto-launches-50-million-fund-for-women-in-digital-trade\/","title":{"rendered":"WTO Launches $50 Million Fund for Women in Digital Trade"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Onyeanya Ebere Immaculata<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has launched a $50 million global fund to empower women entrepreneurs in digital trade, amid rising protectionism and global economic challenges.<\/p>\n

The Women Exporters in the Digital Economy (WEIDE), Fund, a joint initiative with the International Trade Centre, aims to help women-led businesses in developing countries gain skills, resources, and networks for global digital markets.<\/p>\n

The fund is rolling out this year in Nigeria, Jordan, Mongolia, and the Dominican Republic.<\/p>\n

Nigeria was selected from over 600 business support organisations, with 146 women entrepreneurs chosen from 67,000 applicants, up from the planned 100 due to high-quality entries.<\/p>\n

Sixteen women in the Booster Track will receive up to $30,000 and 18 months of technical support, while 130 in the Discovery Track will get up to $5,000 and one year of business assistance.<\/p>\n

Beneficiaries work across sectors such as agriculture, IT, fashion, beauty, hospitality, and manufacturing.<\/p>\n

Okonjo-Iweala urged women to \u201cnot just survive, but thrive on the world stage.\u201d<\/p>\n

She highlighted challenges including Nigeria\u2019s low internet penetration, with only 45% online compared to the global average of 67%, and stressed the need for reliable electricity and cross-ministerial collaboration.<\/p>\n

Citing digital trade\u2019s growth from $1 trillion in 2005 to $4.25 trillion today, she noted Africa captures less than 1% of the market.<\/p>\n

Only 30% of Nigerian tech firms are women-owned, with the country ranking 128th out of 148 in the Global Gender Gap Report.<\/p>\n

Warning that customs duties on digital trade could limit access for small businesses, she encouraged beneficiaries to expand markets and inspire other women.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen women succeed, communities succeed, economies succeed,\u201d Okonjo-Iweala said. \u201cThis is not just a moral case, it is an economic case.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Onyeanya Ebere Immaculata   WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has launched a $50 million global fund to empower women entrepreneurs in digital trade, amid rising protectionism and global economic challenges. The Women Exporters in the Digital Economy (WEIDE), Fund, a joint initiative with the International Trade Centre, aims to help women-led businesses in developing countries […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":73209,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1718,172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73208"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73208\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":73210,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73208\/revisions\/73210"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}