Home ›› 11 Mar 2023 ›› Opinion
In Bangladesh, women are taking on a pivotal role in the nation’s ambitious drive towards achieving developed status by 2041. Over the last decades, Bangladesh has made remarkable strides in reducing infant and child mortality rates, alleviating poverty, promoting women's entrepreneurship, and improving access to education and healthcare. These accomplishments have garnered extensive recognition, with Bangladesh topping the list of South Asian countries in gender equality as per the Gender Gap Index 2022 of the World Economic Forum. Bangladesh has demonstrated exceptional regional performance, having effectively bridged over 69 per cent of the gender gap, thereby securing the 71st position globally among 146 countries.
The increase in the number of young female students has been substantial. At present, girls account for 49.5 per cent of students in primary schools, indicating a marked departure from previous years. Meanwhile, in terms of net enrolment rates, female students show higher figures than males, with 97.44 per cent in primary school and 79.09 per cent in secondary school in 2021. The introduction of different incentive packages including stipend programs for girls, provision of separate toilets, midday meals have encouraged female students to attend their classes. Additionally, Bangladesh is on track to achieve gender parity in tertiary education, which has increased from 0.37 in 1991 to 0.80 in 2021. The increased enrolment of females in educational institutions has facilitated a surge in women participation within the labour market, signifying a momentous development in Bangladesh. The expansion of educational opportunities for women has empowered them to perform more significant roles within the workforce.
However, women have made notable progress in terms of their participation in the labour force in the last decade. The country’s flagship export sector – the Readymade Garment (RMG) industry – has been a driving force of women’s employment in the mainstream economy employing more than four million workforces. Since the 1990s, women’s labour force participation has more than doubled but has now been stagnant at a low level of 36 per cent. It is higher than such South Asian countries as India (22 per cent), Pakistan (22 per cent) and Sri Lanka (35 per cent), but much lower than Southeast Asian countries, such as Cambodia (76 per cent), Indonesia (53 per cent), the Philippines (43 per cent), Thailand (59 per cent), and Vietnam (63 per cent).
Despite the increased participation of women in different sectors, there remains a lack of dynamism in their employment. Although more women entrepreneurs have come up with their own business and created employment opportunities for other women, they are encountering several challenges. Meanwhile, due to COVID-19, 41 per cent of the women-led businesses had to completely shut down its operation. Those who continued their business operations had to either reduce in size (7.10 per cent) or had to relocate to a smaller or cheaper place (2.90 per cent) to keep the business running. About 17 per cent of the women-led Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) had to completely close down business operations and one-third of the women entrepreneurs had to reduce business operations. To cushion the fallout of COVID-19 pandemic, the government rolled out stimulus packages for businesses. The total loan disbursement among women entrepreneurs was even lower in the 2nd phase. Of the total loan disbursement, only 2.65 per cent of the disbursed stimulus loan was received by 4913 women entrepreneurs.
Women’s access to financial services is constrained by women’s limited asset ownership, lack of awareness regarding credit facilities and social exclusion. Cumbersome documentation procedures, distance from bank branches, unsuitable financial products, and negative attitudes of staff to women are also contributing factors that limit women from accessing necessary capital and credit facilities required for running a business. However, women’s mobility constraints, socio-cultural factors, distance, ease, and safety of travel are important considerations in work-related decisions. Poor physical infrastructure of most semi-urban, urban, and rural areas of Bangladesh pose a challenge for women’s mobility outside their home.
Due to poor infrastructure women cannot access marketplace to purchase resources required for expanding business. Moreover, women in Bangladesh can legally sign a contract, open a bank account, register a business, and apply for loans without the consent of husbands; yet there are banks and programmes that continue to require consent from male relatives or husbands. Women even face significant legal barriers to run a business; particularly businesses that are deemed to be physically arduous or dangerous for women.
The government of Bangladesh, along with other government agencies, has implemented multiple policies and strategies aimed at addressing the difficulties confronted by women entrepreneurs to ensure supportive environment for businesses led by women. In light of the various obstacles encountered by women-led entrepreneurs, a gender sensitive approach must be taken to lessen the challenges. Meanwhile, the burdensome documentation requirement needs to be streamlined through automation and simpler procedural requirements. Given the multifarious challenges of access to finance for women-led enterprises in securing access to finance, one potential solution to this issue could be to offer collateral-free loans through close collaboration with district women chambers.
To facilitate such lending practices, the experience of SME Foundation in credit wholesaling could be explored, particularly in easing the financial constraints experienced by exporters. Despite policy support provided by national plans and the Bangladesh Bank, many women entrepreneurs are unable to access these loans due to procedural barriers. In order to address this challenge, a gender-sensitive approach could be adopted to simplify loan application procedures and provide more lenient payment terms. In addition, a dedicated business promotion and capacity building intervention should be undertaken to promote women’s participation in businesses both at home and exporting.
The writers are researchers
