Africa-Press – Liberia. UN Women, the United Nations principal entity on gender equality and women’s empowerment, in partnership with Orange Foundation, have launched an “e-commerce or e-market” that links women farmers and entrepreneurs (buyers) to market, information and finance.
Through this internet platform, women farmers will be able to sell their produce, including potatoes, pepper, rice, cassava, amongst others.
The e-commerce platform, called “Buy from Women”, was launched at the Orange Digital Center (ODC) in Congo Town, on Thursday, December 1, 2022.
The digitized empowerment initiative is a UN Women signature (flagship) program, aimed to strengthen the economic empowerment and the resilience to disasters of smallholder women farmers.
The project is being implemented through the partnership with Orange Foundation and the Liberian government through the Cooperative Development Agency (CDA), the Ministries of Agriculture, and Gender.
The joint project is known as “Leverage Digital Inclusion for the Economic Empowerment and Resilience to Disasters of Rural Women Smallholders and Entrepreneurs in Liberia” (D4WEE).
Sara Buchanan, the Executive Director of the Orange Foundation Liberia, said, “Orange is happy to be part of history, where Liberia is experiencing an increase in access to and use of information and communication technology (ICT), which impacts women, their households, and the community.”
She said smallholder women and youth farmers have been highly vulnerable to shocks, given the inevitability of environmental hazards and increased unpredictability, such as floods brought on by climate change, but the technology will provide the opportunities to detect, reduce, and avoid environmental hazards, build resilience, and facilitate access to markets and finance in order to increase production.
The French Ambassador to Liberia, Michaël Roux; African Development Bank Country Manager, Benedict Kanu; and UNDP Deputy Country Representative for Operations, Trabant Mabodoko, thanked UN Women and the Orange Foundation for the pilot launch and expressed optimism that the digitization will economically empower and equip more women smallholder farmers, entrepreneurs, and small business owners.
UN Women Country Representative, Comfort Lamptey, disclosed that Liberia has joined other countries, including Mali, South Africa, Haiti, Costa Rica on the “Buy from Women” portal, an open-source, cloud-based enterprise and e-commerce platform, developed by UN Women, available in both web and app and delivered in multiple languages.
She said the launch is the pilot stage, and UN Women seeks collaboration with other UN entities, such as WFP and FAO “to add value to the project by harnessing their comparative advantages.”
She thanked Alibaba, Orange, Sweden, UNDP and the Government of Liberia for the support and partnership.
“The platform affords women entrepreneurs and business holders easier access to additional markets, information, and finance,” Madam Lamptey said.
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