Speech at the 12th Mediterranean Women Entrepreneurs Forum

Distinguished participants, 

I am very honoured to welcome you today and to open this 12th edition of the Mediterranean Women Entrepreneurs Forum.

I would particularly like to thank María Helena de Felipe for the invitation - she is not only the President of one of the organisers, the Federation of organisations of Mediterranean business women, but also an extremely active member of the European Economic and Social Committee. Congratulations !

As you have understood, I represent the European Economic and Social Committee, and I was elected as new President end of October. 

Our Committee is an advisory body of the European Union that represents employers, trade unions and other civil society organisations – like NGOs, consumers, people with disabilities, farmers, young people. I come myself from the Employers' Group.

Our key mission is to make the voice of organised civil society heard at EU level, by the European institutions, and we ensure that European policies reflect the situation on the ground more accurately and that they are better understood in the EU countries. 

Ladies and gentlemen, 

This year the MedaWomen Entrepreneurship Forum is held in the context of the 25th anniversary of the Barcelona process. 

A quarter of a century has passed since the launch of this process that aims to strengthen relations between Europe and the Southern Mediterranean countries. 

In this period, the trade volume between the two shores of the Mediterranean has grown at an average annual rate of 8 %, reaching nearly 10 % of the EU's total external trade last year. 

However, this anniversary also comes at a time of great disruption. The current health crisis notably has a severe economic and social impact on both shores of the Mediterranean, and women have been particularly affected by the hardship unleashed by the pandemic. Businesses struggle to survive and to keep their employees, people lose their jobs and social inequalities are deepening.  

Covid-19 is a stark reminder of the need for tangible and coordinated cooperation across borders, sectors and generations. Our collective response will determine how fast the region recovers after the pandemic. 

We certainly need to become more resilient for the future; our efforts to recover from the crisis are also an opportunity to put in place a different post-COVID world: more prosperous, greener, digital and social inclusive.   

It is also time for a great push for gender equality in all fields and for rethinking women's role in the economy. 

Women are at the forefront of the battle against Covid-19, very often risking their lives to save others. They represent 70% of the health and social sector workforce globally. 

Unfortunately, they are still underrepresented at institutional, political and economic levels. There is a continuing gender gap in terms of entrepreneurship, which translates into fewer women entrepreneurs all over the world.

A recent report of EIB and the Commission observes that in Europe, women represent roughly 52% of the overall population in Europe, but constitute only 34% of the self-employed in the European Union and 30% of its start-up entrepreneurs. This is an unexploited potential for economic growth. Also, self-employed women are less well-off than self-employed men. 76 % of self-employed women in the EU are own account workers without employees, compared to 69% of men.

Giving more credit and support to women entrepreneurs makes totally sense, and not only from a social perspective, but also from an economical perspective. Women can play a decisive role in the recovery. The businesses that they lead tend to be more productive, faster-growing and innovative. According to the European Commission, improvements to gender equality could create 10.5 million jobs by 2050 and boost the EU economy by between 1.95 and 3.15 trillion €. 

In general, achieving gender equality in all fields is particularly critical to improve the labour market situation of young women and men in the Mediterranean region, the region with the highest youth unemployment worldwide. Entrepreneurship is also a clear opportunity for women's own economic independence. It also allows them to network and to avoid being isolated, especially the women in small town, rural environments.

Female entrepreneurship must therefore also be supported in several ways. The objective is to allow them to succeed in emerging and growing sectors, like the ICT, green economy, industry 4.0, e-commerce.

To give some examples: 

1. Entrepreneurship education should be mainstreamed into education and training. It should also be more practice-oriented.

2. Women need targeted funding, guidance and business services. We need to remove structural barriers with regard to access to finance. Mentoring business champions and innovative forms of financing can be useful to overcome barriers. 

3. We need to tackle segregation and stereotypes and encourage girls and women to be active in certain male dominated sectors, such as ICT. In Europe, only 10% of women pursue a career in these fields.

4. Addressing the digital gender gap is also a must. The coronavirus crisis has showed us the importance of being digital, to be resilient to crisis. Digital technologies have become an essential tool allowing us to deliver during this pandemic. It is true for governments, legislators and public institutions and it is true for businesses. 

Allow me to say a few more words on digitalisation, as it is now an integral component of the economic recovery plan: 

The digital transformation is having a far-reaching impact on the business environment. New technologies can offer numerous opportunities, and companies that become competent and move quickly in these areas during the crisis will have a strategic advantage over their competitors in the post-pandemic economy.

We need to find a way to take advantage of the opportunities of digitalisation, allowing SMEs, large companies and non-profit economic actors as well as workers and consumers to benefit alike.

To mention just a few of the opportunities linked to the digitalisation and new technologies:

  • Productivity can be improved, by enabling innovation and reducing the costs of business processes. Trends such as e-commerce, big data, Artificial Intelligence and the Internet of Things could lead to large productivity gains for the economy. 
  • Digital Innovation Hubs (DIH), which are being set up in many local economic systems in Europe, are very useful. These Hubs act as one-stop-shops where companies —especially SMEs and startups— can get access to technology-testing, financing advice, market intelligence and networking opportunities. The involvement of social partners and civil society can ensure that the work done by the hubs is tailored to the needs of local businesses and workers. 
  • Digitalisation also offers a great potential for sustainability. We need to support digital solutions that allow us to protect the environment and green sectors like transport, energy, construction and agriculture.
  • Digitalisation has also played a role in the Arab Spring – the social movement of major importance for the Mediterranean region. These movements would never have gained their force without the use of smartphones and social media. Women accounted for 60 % of protesters of the Arab Spring movements. 
  • To reap opportunities offered by digitalisation, we need to improve the digital capacity of businesses and in particular of SMEs. Also, equipping people with the right skills, all life long, is key. Many workers in the EU still need support with the basics of digitalisation and I am sure that the Southern Mediterranean businesses are facing the same challenges. 
  • We also have to pay attention to the challenges posed by digitalisation – being inclusive, mind the gap between digital natives and older people and addressing it through education and digital training; tackle the income disparities; improve the access to social security; promote constructive social dialogue.

Dear participants, 

Let me finish with a quote, from the Stanford economist Paul Romer: "A crisis is a terrible thing to waste" – I hope our decision makers will not lose the opportunity to give full support to female entrepreneurs. It is not only a matter of fairness towards women and equity, but it is also a way to unleash growth in our economies and societies. 

Thank you very much for your attention. I look forward to very interesting discussions.

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Speech at the 12th Mediterranean Women Entrepreneurs Forum

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