Women’s Empowerment, World Bank Approves $500m Loan For FG

According to a statement, the World Bank Group has approved a loan of $500m to help Nigeria drive women’s empowerment.

This marked second loan approved by the World Bank under the new President, Bola Tinubu.

Following a statement by the World Bank, it stated “The World Bank has approved $500m for Nigeria for Women Program Scale Up (NFWP-SU). The scale-up financing will further support the government of Nigeria to invest in improving the livelihoods of women in Nigeria.

“The NFWP-SU will help to ensure better economic opportunities for women, which is essential for addressing gender inequality; guaranteeing better education, health, and nutrition outcomes for families; and building women’s and communities’ resilience to climate change.”

The World Bank Country Director for Nigeria, Shubham Chaudhuri, also said, “We have seen promising outcomes from the parent NFWP which has helped to create economic opportunities for thousands of rural women through the Women Affinity Groups. NFWP’s model is helping to improve livelihood opportunities for women and enhancing their capacity to adapt to climate change and to participate in local administrations for policymaking related to community empowerment.

“Closing the gender gap in key economic sectors could yield gains of between $9.3bn and $22.9bn, we are optimistic that this scale-up will help Nigeria to move closer to bridging this gap.”

It was noted that NFWP has been implemented in six states and also provides support to over 427,887 Women Affinity Groups’ members through the formation and strengthening of 20,506 of these groups.