Xinhua, Kigali :
Government officials and women activists at the ongoing African Development Bank meetings in Kigali urged governments to empower women to participate in Africa ‘s economy so as to sustain growth.
Speaking at a panel on gender equality Wednesday, they called for fair and equal access to land ownership, credit facilities and education for women across the continent.
“The growth that we are experiencing on the continent, including my country, is of such quality that it has not helped reduce gender disparity,” Ngazi Okonjo- Iweala, Nigeria’s Minister of Finance said and called for more discussion on how women can be included in Africa’s economic prosperity.
She underscored the importance of improving girls’ education and economic empowerment in order to reduce gender disparity on the continent.
According to her, enrollment of girls in school went up 40 percent in Nigeria’s Kano state, where they ran a pilot program of conditional cash transfer to parents who sent their daughter to school.
It was noted that sending girls to school not only provides them with the knowledge to participate in their country’s economy, but also reduces the likelihood of early marriage or childbirth.
The executive director of UN Women Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, observed that marrying off children early is absolutely detrimental to gender equality.
“Their capacity to be productive citizens, she said, is cut off and their right to make a difference is also lost.
With women providing the majority of agricultural labor in Africa but with few female landowners, she stressed the need to give women more access to productive resources in agriculture.
“It has been argued that if we were to give women just as much input as we supply for men, we would be able to increase food security of about 150 million people,” Mlambo-Ngcuka said.
Rwanda’s Minister of gender Oda Gasinzigwa said a legal framework was created in the country to register land ownership, 26 percent of owners are women and many head their household.
