Women and the Business Call to Action

The UNDP’s inclusive business programme Business Call to Action is a strong advocate of using the private sector to advance the empowerment of women at the base of the pyramid.

This was demonstrated at the event they held in March 2014 with the US Chamber of Commerce Foundation called ‘Turning inspiration into action: Next steps for the private sector.... It is also evident in the composition of their portfolio of 94 member companies.

Thirty eight of the 94 BCtA member companies have committed to contributing to the realisation of the third Millenium Development Goal, which is to promote gender equality and empower women. As part of the research for the upcoming flagship report that looks at the progress of the BCtA portfolio, we conducted an in-depth survey with 49 of the companies where we asked them to estimate what proportion of their beneficiaries are women. Of the 24 companies that responded to this aspect of the survey, 19 said that at least half the beneficiaries of their initiatives are women. In fact, ten respondents said that women comprise the majority or nearly all of the people benefited by their inclusive business. However, this question was left unanswered by half of survey respondents, who perhaps don't have the data.

The four that answered that nearly all their beneficiaries are women, benefit them as suppliers, employees or entrepreneurs. These companies are having a major impact on the lives of women at the BoP by providing secure earning opportunities as well as training and skills to enhance their incomes.

L’OCCITANE EN PROVENCE is a global, organic-based cosmetics company that has been working to improve the shea butter supply chain in Burkina Faso since the company’s early days in the 1980s. Women traditionally harvest the shea nut and undertake primary processing into shea butter, which is the product that L’OCCITANE purchase. Through training and support, L’OCCITANE has helped the women produce a good quality product, and the company pays almost four times the prevailing price for this quality and consistency. Around 15,000 women have already benefitted directly as collectors and processors in the company’s supply chain, which in turn impacts of the lives of around 200,000 people in terms of benefits to other household members and jobs created elsewhere in the supply chain.

MUJI’s initiative to source products from local communities in Kenya and Kyrgyzstan also benefits women. In Kyrgyzstan, the Japanese lifestyle brand buys felt products that are made mainly by women because the technique is traditionally transferred from mothers to daughters. In Kenya, MUJI helps communities produce animal figures made from soapstone. Men undertake the mining of the stone and make the basic shapes, but women do most of the washing and polishing process.

The Coca-Cola Company’s BCtA initiative expands its network of locally owned micro distribution outlets across Africa. By engaging low-income people to distribute Coke to hard-to-reach areas, the initiative creates economic opportunities for women as distributors as well as retailers, recyclers and artisans. Over 70% of beneficiaries are estimated to be women.

Employment-focused initiatives can disproportionately benefit women when they are in industries that are female-dominated. The ready-made garment industry is one such industry, which is why H&M’s initiative to develop a skill development centre of excellence in Bangladesh for RMG will mostly benefit women.

There are also initiatives where the beneficiaries are consumers that mainly benefit women. LifeSpring Hospitals, for example, specialises in delivering high-quality maternal health care to low-income women in India. In the energy sector, initiatives that provide safe and efficient cooking technology - such as Oando’s portable liquid petroleum gas stoves in Nigeria, and Envirofit’s initiative in Kenya - often mainly benefit women in cultures where women do most of the cooking.