Businesswomen still face difficulties says LBWA survey
Businesswomen still face difficulties says LBWA survey
Lao businesswomen have played an important role in helping the government drive the country's economic growth but they are lacking sufficient support policies, according to recent survey.
The survey asked 300 businesswomen in 10 provinces questions around business support and was done in cooperation between the Lao Business Women's Association (LBWA) and the Mekong Business Initiative with support from the Australian government and the Asian Development Bank.
It was undertaken in July-August 2016.
The LBWA reported that its' survey, conducted during a meeting on SME's strategy development held recently, suggests that government issued policies on supporting businesswomen still don't equal regional or international standards.
The Benchmark Tool for Women's Entrepreneurship policy reported last year and piloted in Australia, Singapore, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam by the Mekong Business Initiative pointed out that Laos was behind all of those countries in businesswomen promotion.
Though businesswomen run over 75 percent of their operations on their own and appear to interact with their customers better than their businessmen counterparts, according to another survey of businesswomen carried out in 2016 in the production and service sectors.
That survey also showed that 63 percent of businesswomen find it more difficult than businessmen to access finance sources with the rates of high interest from banks still a challenge for women making the decision to start their own business.
Therefore, businesswomen are suggesting that the government should issue regula tions as well as policies focused on directly supporting these women.
For example, the government should support the LBWA to be able to increase the standard and quality of women's business management while businesswomen should be encouraged to take on new roles while doing business.
It's been suggested that the government should also be keen to use vocational education as a key part of its strategy to improve the women's business environment.
Vocational education would provide businesswomen with training of a higher standard so that they could then successfully enter the job market and start living more self-reliant lives, experts say.
