ICR Stories

In 2022, we published a blog post recounting a field study conducted in the Bugesera and Rulindo regions of Rwanda. Our ICR intervention aimed to interact with producers and stakeholders from fifteen agroforestry value chains to assess the business environment of these and gain insights to further develop them.   Through this intervention, we partnered […]

The Union of the Comoros, an archipelago off the southeastern coast of Africa, has enormous potential to develop its economy. It is the world’s number one producer of ylang ylang essential oil, it harvests spices, vanilla and cloves. Furthermore, the beautiful island has incredible potential to further develop its tourism industry.   In February 2023, […]

Meet Mariama, a highly qualified young professional, who has decided to work in the UK, instead of Ghana, the country where she was trained. Her diverse professional and voluntary journey has enabled her to hone her skills in customer service, business administration and community outreach. Despite her skills and experience, Mariama struggled to find employment […]

Botswana is looking to reshape its future. The longest uninterrupted democracy in Africa, the middle-income country has set out a transformational agenda that it hopes will see it achieve prosperity for all. Vision 2036 has an aim to turn Botswana into a high-income country by building an inclusive and thriving private sector, with a particular […]

Register for our upcoming event here Adeline, a young woman from Burkina Faso, wanted to get a job, but she faced the challenge of organising caring for her youngest children. Lots of other women from her area had taken up roles in a government-backed roadbuilding and construction programme and many of them, with no alternative, […]

In this transformative era of evolving policies and regulations that are part of the business environment, it is crucial to actively involve all segments of the population and especially young minds since the policies of today will impact how tomorrow looks. Quite often the reforms of policies and regulation are taken top-down excluding from the […]

On financing and capital markets, women are worse-off than men. Women have less access to finance, assets and collateral. Additionally, the world is faced with an unprecedented climate crisis, with disasters increasing in their severity, frequency and unpredictability. To achieve a gender-equal and ecological transformation of economies, Public Development Banks (PDBs) come into play. PDBs […]

Côte d’Ivoire has been an African success story for much of the last decade. The World Bank estimates that its GDP growth rate was on average 8.2% in the seven years between 2012 and 2019, one of the most dynamic in the world. Much of its growth comes from small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which account for […]

Under Ugandan law, a woman who lives with a man but is not legally married to him has no legal rights to their joint finances. It’s a situation that needs to change for women to gain equal access to property and ownership, and to fulfil their economic potential. FIDA-Uganda is an association of women’s lawyers which would like to see the law changed so that women in cohabiting relationships have equal access their property. This is crucial for women’s economic empowerment – without the ability to access and control their own economic assets, women cannot have economic autonomy or access credit.

Last month, we embarked on a visit to Belize as part of our Investment Climate Reform (ICR) facility intervention, aiming to evaluate the business environment for the tourism sector of Ambergris Caye. This Caribbean destination is renowned for its vibrant marine life, beaches, and the warm hospitality of its people, attracting over 60% of all visitors to Belize. One of the recurring concerns that emerged during our discussions with private and public representatives was the persistent and escalating presence of sargassum seaweed. This natural phenomenon, intensified by the impacts of climate change, poses a significant threat to the local tourism industry and its associated businesses.

In Malawi 37% of women have experienced some form of gender violence in their lifetime. However, only half of MSMEs surveyed by the ICR Facility have documented some guidelines to address issues of gender inequality and sexual discrimination. In close cooperation with the ICR Facility, the Employers’ Consultative Association of Malawi (ECAM) has been working to address these deficits by identifying the problems women face through gender audit and raising awareness by training the ECAM members. It is, however, only the first step to eliminate sexual harassment and allow women to fulfil their potential at the workplace.

Only around 4% of women-led businesses could service a loan in the Democratic Republic of Congo. This is because of the regulations and practices which require women to seek approval from their husbands on conducting economic activities or their inability to claim commonly acquired property during marriage as collateral. However, due to the efficient advocacy by civil actors who promoted an economic case for gender reforms, some legislative improvements have been recently made, such as the revision of the Family Code. Implementing the new laws, however, remains a major task.