Women businesses get seed funding 

The National Social Security Fund (NSSF) in partnership with Mastercard Foundation have awarded Shs 4.8 billion seed funding to 66 women entrepreneurs through their Hi-innovator Women Accelerator program with each business receiving Shs 75 million.

The Hi-Innovator Women Accelerator is a women-only cohort to give women entrepreneurs across all sectors an even opportunity to improve their business skills, grow their businesses into resilient enterprises that are more competitive and better placed to receive financial services.

While announcing the successful businesses in Kampala last week, Adrian Bukenya, the country director of the Mastercard Foundation, noted that women-led businesses in Uganda face challenges in accessing finance, information, networks and training as well as cultural and social barriers.

He added that these challenges make it difficult for women entrepreneurs to start, run and grow their businesses.

“This initiative is a specific intervention that we are hoping can stimulate the interest in women innovation and sustainable ways of getting young people into work,” he said.

According to Patrick Ayota, the acting managing director of NSSF, the first two cohorts of the program have created 55,000 direct and indirect jobs and out of those, about 1,600 workers have already joined the Fund and contributed about Shs 93 million.

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