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                                                                                 Spring 2008
              Womenable E3 News
In This Issue
E1: News in Brief
E2: Women's History Month
E3: Empowering Women's Enterprise in the UK
Womenable comments on SBA's proposed procurement rules

Bank vault door







Womenable President and CEO Julie Weeks sent a Valentine's Day 'love letter' to the U.S. Small Business Administration in response to their  'coal in the stocking' Christmas present to the nation's women's business community: unduly restrictive proposed rules governing the access of women-owned small businesses to the Federal procurement arena.

What did we say?
Quick Links
News in Brief Links

Canada: Telfer Women and Enterprise Working Paper Series

Center for Women's Leadership at Babson College

Circle of Blue

Global Entrepreneurship Monitor

Water Aid

World Water Day


Women's History Links

Biography.com

International Women's Day-BBC

International Women's Day-VOA

Marie Curie

Sylvia Pankhurst

UN Commission on Status of women meetings

UN Secretary General remarks

Women of Our Time photo gallery

Women's suffrage rally


UK Enterprise Strategy Links

UK Department of Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform

UK Enterprise Strategy - link to full document

UK Enterprise Strategy - summary of women's enterprise initiatives

WBC NoVA

WBENC

WEConnect
Susan B. Anthony

"Of all the old prejudices that cling to the hem of the woman's garments and persistently impede her progress, none holds faster than this - the idea that she owes service to a man instead of to herself, and that it is her highest duty to aid his development rather than her own."
 ~ Susan B. Anthony (1820 - 1906),
women's suffrage leader

(Women's History Month is celebrated in March
 in a number of countries)
E3nabling News

It is our goal, in this quarterly newsletter, to provide a concise digest of news, information and links to 1: educate, 2: enlighten and 3: empower your work on behalf of nascent, new, established and growing women-owned enterprises around the world.
 
Our subscribers come from all walks of life - businesses large and small, NGOs and MLOs, associations, the public sector and educational institutions - yet all share a common interest in supporting women's enterprise development in their communities and around the world. We hope you find this information of interest.
 
 E1ducate: News in Brief

GEM 2007 report coverLike many of us, you may now be coming out of 'winter hibernation' and are looking for some fresh new information about what's going on out there in the world of women's entrepreneurship. The short answer is: plenty! The new GEM report has been published, as has a report focused on women's export activity in Canada. In a few short weeks the 4th annual GEM report on women and entrepreneurship will be published. And, if you read a bit further in this e-newsletter, you'll learn more about women's history month and the great things that are happening in women's enterprise across the pond in the UK.

But first, here's a quick summary of some new and impending information:
  • New Global Entrepreneurship Monitor report published: Entrepreneurship researchers from 42 countries contributed to this year's annual Global Entrepreneurship Monitor research effort, published recently. The new report not only contains the annual look at 'total entrepreneurial activity' in 42 countries (this year divided into 23 high income countries, 11 middle/low income countries in Europe and Asia, and 8 middle/low income countries in Latin America and the Caribbean) but a refined analysis of entrepreneurial perceptions/intentions among adult populations AND an interesting look at 'entrepreneurial framework conditions.'

    Of course, the report also shows a continuing gender gap in entrepreneurial activity. We, and other womenablers, eagerly anticipate the release of the annual Women and Entrepreneurship report, coming in May (see next item). Learn more about the current report, and download both the general and women-specific reports, at the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor web site.


  • Women's GEM report coming in May: May 2nd is the date - and New York City is the location - for the launch of the 4th annual GEM report focused on women's entrepreneurship internationally. Save the date announcements for the symposium, entitled "Growing Sustainable Businesses: Best Practices for Women Entrepreneurs," are just going out from The Center for Women's Leadership at Babson College, who will host the event along with Ernst & Young. For more information, visit their web site, or contact Center Director Jan Shubert.
  • New Working Paper Series on Women's Enterprise in Canada: Long-time women's enterprise researcher Barbara Orser has recently published a paper focused on women-owned firms and their involvement (or lack thereof) in the international marketplace. The study found that women-owned firms are underrepresented among SME exporters in Canada, and that the impact of gender on exporting varies by industry sector and by ethnicity."Gender and Export Propensity" also marks the launch of the Telfer Women and Enterprise Working Paper Series. To obtain a free copy of the report, click here.
  • World Water Day: Water is becoming a big issue - not only geopolitically, but for communities facing weather extremes and for individuals who do not have ready access to running water. This past weekend, March 22, was World Water Day. To learn more about how water affects development, politics and civil society, visit these informative web sites:
 E2nlighten: Women's History Month
Listening to the voices of women leaders

suffragettes

March marks the celebration of International Women's Day on the 8th, as well as a month-long commemoration in some countries (though not all - it is celebrated in August in South Africa and October in Canada, for example) of the progress that women are making in political, social and economic spheres of influence - as well as the disparity that still exists in all of these arenas.

To honor the achievements of women - and to take advantage of the wealth of information that now exists on the web - Womenable offers, for your enlightenment, an audio and video gallery of links that celebrate women's history past and present.
  • This month also saw the 52nd meeting in New York of the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women, which focused much of its meeting this year on the issues of 'gender budgeting' - ensuring that government budgets and programs pay particular attention to the unique needs and barriers faced by women. Here is a Voice of America article and audio podcast covering the meeting.
  • It is also important during this month to pay tribute to our 'foremothers', not only to honor their achievements but to acknowledge that the barriers they have broken have made it easier for each of us to pursue our dreams. Here are a few links we thought that you would enjoy:
E3mpower: Women's Enterprise Gets Huge Boost in the U.K.
New national Enterprise Strategy, new Women's Enterprise Centre of Excellence

Mind the GapWhile women's enterprise advocates in the U.K. have spent much time studying U.S. policies and programs supporting women's enterprise development, they have once again 'stolen a march' on the U.S. and on many other nations in the recent publication of a nationwide enterprise strategy - one that places strong focus on supporting women's entrepreneurship as a way to rev up the national economy and close the entrepreneurship gap between the U.K. and other nations.

Last year, the Department of Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR, the former Department of Trade and Industry) launched a review of its enterprise development initiatives, with an eye toward increasing program efficiency and impact. At the time there were fears that support for women's enterprise would suffer in the move toward streamlining program delivery.

During their deliberations on potential areas of emphasis in the strategy, Womenable was invited by the British government to brief the Honourable Stephen Timms, then the Minister for Competitiveness in the BERR. (Since that time, Shriti Vadera has replaced Timms as the Minister.) Weeks presented information on trends in women's enterprise development in the United States, with a special emphasis on sharing what has worked well and not so well, and offered lessons learned for possible adaptation and implementation in the United Kingdom. Weeks also met with UK Secretary of State John Hutton when he came to the U.S. in February on a fact-finding mission, briefing him at a special session held at the Women's Business Center of Northern Virginia.

Those efforts, among many others, paid off with the publication of the Enterprise Strategy on March 11, entitled "Enterprise: unlocking the UK's talent." Among the highlights for womenablers to note are:
  • The piloting of business development assistance targeted to women, based on the U.S. women's business center model, in four additional regions. Womenable is mentioned by name in the strategy in this regard; we will be consulting with BERR on the launch, monitoring, and assessment of these pilot programs. There is one such WBC-like program already in operation - the Women's Business Development Agency in the West Midlands.
  • A new Women's Investment Fund, with the government putting up half of a total of �25M to invest in growth- oriented women-led firms.
  • Increased support for mentoring programs, utilizing an Ambassadors network launched last year, and existing networks.
  • Access to corporate market opportunities, with the launch and government support of WEConnect - a third-party women's enterprise certification program based on WBENC in the U.S., and launched with their assistance just last month.
  • Eventual expansion of the newly-launched Women's Enterprise Centre of Expertise (WECOE) in the West Midlands to be a national centre of expertise on women's enterprise. In a late-breaking development, long-time advocate and thought leader in women's enterprise in the UK - Jackie Brierton - has just been named as director of WECOE.
To download and read the strategy, visit the BERR web site. In addition to downloading the full 97-page strategy, you may also wish to download this 2-page summary of the key elements of the women's enterprise strategy.
We encourage your feedback and comments, as well as your help in spreading our "womenabling" news. Feel free to click below to forward this e-mail to others you feel would be interested in any or all of the articles above. And let us know if there are any aspects of women's enterprise development that you feel we should investigate and share more broadly.
 
Sincerely,
Julie R. Weeks
Womenable