• Pastor Mutale from the Lubuto Home Industry.

By Margaret Mangani  –
THE month of September has been set aside as one for the women’s entrepreneur during which the Copperbelt Province has been privileged to hold the first women empowerment exposition comprising 50 women drawn from 10 districts.
The participants gathered in Ndola under the auspices of the Ministry of Gender and Child Development supported by other cooperating partners with a view to firstly learn some entrepreneurial skills, value-addition and later on showcase their products.
Most of the participants are engaged in various activities ranging from poultry, shoe-making and tailoring, among others. They were picked to train for five days during an expo which started on September 6, 2015, running through to the 12th.
At the end of it all, the women had to showcase some of their products during an exhibition held at Henry Makulu Lodge in Ndola. Then they were presented with certificates.
During the official opening of the expo, Copperbelt Province Permanent Secretary Howard Sikwela said the holding of the expo was meant to empower women with various skills training.
A number of trainers drawn from various organisations, including the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and banks, were incorporated to impart knowledge into the participants who were eager to go away empowered with the hope of improving their small-scale business entities as well as adding value to their products.
The whole idea of training them was for them to obtain knowledge so that they could become change-agents to others.
The permanent secretary said that women were usually at the receiving end even when it came to diseases such as HIV and AIDS. They were ones who bore the brunt of the disease.
He further urged men to support women in all organisations when it came to empowering them in the face of the challenges that they faced daily.
The first women’s exposition in the province was held under the theme ‘Promoting Young Women Entrepreneurs as Change Agents for National Development’.
This is against the background that the poverty situation in Zambia shows that 68 per cent of women live below the poverty line.
This is according to a speech delivered by Gender and Child Development Deputy Minister Dorothy Kazunga during the official opening of the same event.
The whole essence of training the women brings to light the saying that if you educate a woman then you educate a nation.
In her speech, Ms Kazunga said this was due to the low social economic status of women and the constraints which they faced to have themselves empowered.
Ms Kazunga said to this effect the Government was committed to attaining gender equity at all levels of the provincial development through improving the participation of women in economic development.
In addition, the population workforce between males and females shows a momentous difference.
This is a true scenario obtaining in most of the various departments.
Entrepreneurship represents a huge economic sector not only in Zambia but world-wide and its benefits to women are obvious and documented.
Entreprenuership is most important because it offers various opportunities for wealth creation for women.
One of the participants at the expo, Irene Mbao of Tiyende Women’s Club in Mpatamato, Luanshya, narrated how she had over the years engaged in preparation of a soya porridge which has turned out to be useful for people of all ages, especially those who are terminally ill.
Ms Mbao said she was a living testimony because her husband suffered from diabetes and after taking the porridge which contains maize, soya, millet and groundnuts, his well-being had improved greatly.
Another participant Pastor Grace Mutale of Lubuto Home Industry, who was in the business of making curios through her own local creativity, complained of lack of a market to sell her products.
She said they were only accorded slots during the Zambia International Trade Fair (ZITF )as well as the Lusaka Agriculture Show.
But she complained that for the rest of the year, many people did not know where to find them, yet they produced curios made from local materials.
The current exposition, which is the first of its kind on the Copperbelt, does not only provide an overview of the existing potential among women, but it is also an entry point for women’s elf-employment opportunities. However, this potential requires to be harnessed and supported through collaborative efforts.
The history of the holding of the women exposition is that in July 2014 Zambia hosted the third African women’s economic summit (AWES) under the then African Women Realising Africa’s Economic Potential.
The summit was a collaborative effort of new faces, new voices and the African Development Bank which catered for 250 women of which Zambia had one and 50 participants.
The Zambian Government viewed the hosting of third African women’s conference as a means of facilitating gender equality in this regard, Government through the Ministry of Gender and Child Development organised a national exposition to precede AWES so that many more Zambian women, especially from the grass-roots, could be able to participate.
One of the main objectives of the national conference was to promote women’s economic empowerment as an important strategy for achieving national prosperity and development.
The idea which started small was meant to become an annual event and that it be decentralised to the provinces to enable women to participate.
Governmentt has, therefore, decided to hold women’s economic empowerment expos in all the 10 provinces prior to holding the national one.
Strategically the  MGCD looked at the national expo as a means of re-galvanising a national women’s movement which could take on the mantle of advocacy.
The conference was also an opportunity to empower women themselves to become change agents.
One of the main recommendations of the national expo was that the event be held annually and that it becomes decentralised to the provinces to enable more women to participate.
In a speech delivered at the same event, Ms Ng’ambi alluded to the fact that the initiative was one that was targeting one million women over a five-year period with 60 per cent being rural youths and 40 per cent urban youths. The speech was delivered for her by assistant director Yunike Mutale.
She revealed that 200 young women would be targeted in each province annually.