On June 12th- 16th, the World Trade Organization, an intergovernmental organization designed to regulate international trade, held a monumental conference. The ministerial conference known as MC12 opened with an event titled “Unlocking Trade for Women’s Empowerment and Sustainable Development” which focused on increasing women’s participation in international trade. But to understand the magnitude of this particular event, it’s essential to look at some context first.
The WTO’s MC12 took place in Geneva, Switzerland, hosting trade ministers and other senior officials from the WTO’s 164 member nations. Critically, this conference is the highest decision-making body of the WTO. Thus, any topics discussed at the conference are emphasized as the most important to the WTO
In her opening statements, Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala urged WTO members to “deepen and diversify supply networks” with women at the center. DG Okonjo-Iweala furthered that throughout the past few years. However, trade has been thrown off for everyone, women were especially disadvantaged due to preexisting gender disparities in the trade and finance world. Thus, to all conference members, creating real change would only happen when “commitments were translated into action.”
Importantly, the event included a panel of women entrepreneurs who shared their perspectives on starting their businesses, their struggles, and how they overcame them and helped other women become connected to the international market. These entrepreneurs were Mobola Sagoe of Shea Origin, a shea butter firm based in Nigeria, Madhumita Sarkar of Luxe Living, a textile manufacturer in West Bengal, Yohanna Keraf of Du Anyam, a social enterprise from Indonesia, and Agnes Mukamushinja of Nova Coffee from Rwanda. Ultimately, these entrepreneurs were able to overcome adversity and bring both social and economic empowerment to the women that they work with.
For example, Du Anyam, a social enterprise focused on wicker goods, created a system in which they work with local women weavers from rural villages across Indonesia to help socially and economically empower them by providing them a market for their weaving. Through their ingenuity, they were able to overcome the multitude of barriers women weavers had in accessing both the domestic and international market and were able to empower them.
Hanna Keraf, Co-founder of Du Anyam shared Du Anyam’s 8 years+ experience in working with women in remote areas with poor accessibility where transporting goods to the capital or nearest port can be extremely costly. To have economies of scale required us to access a larger pool of women & to introduce manufacturing approaches for community-based production (we do Time Motion Studies on our home-based weaving production!). This means to reduce shipping cost, social enterprises not only bear the high cost of social capital cost in order to increase production & productivity but also financial cost for technical research & development for the most logistic-efficient product designs.
“The challenge to achieve the economics of scale is even bigger in a community- based production. We could have chosen the easy route. But, we chose to work with and continue empowering 1,400+ women weavers in rural Indonesia”, said Hanna Keraf, Co-Founder of Du Anyam.
Specifically, they were chosen as the panelists for the conference due to their extensive experience working with women in rural areas to increase efficiency, production, and overall success.
These four women and their businesses represent the future of the international market. By following in their footsteps, the WTO hopefully can soon implement and fix trade rules and regulations to encourage women’s access to the international marketplace, creating a more equal, and empowered world.