05.06.2024 / News

At SPIEF 2024 they talked about cooperation between the Council of the Eurasian Women's Forum and the business community of the BRICS countries

On the first day of SPIEF-24, a session of the BRICS Women's Business Alliance "BRICS: a new starting point" was held, in which the Chairman of the Council of the Eurasian Women's Forum (EWF), Senator Galina Karelova, took part.

She shared her vision of the prospects for the development of women's entrepreneurship in the BRICS countries and spoke about how the Council of the Eurasian Women's Forum works in this direction.

According to Karelova, the Council sees its task as helping women entrepreneurs use their potential more effectively, including when entering new markets. The expanding BRICS space, in her opinion, opens up new prospects for women entrepreneurs in all 10 countries, which means it requires knowledge and ideas about what and how can be offered to each other and how ready women’s business communities are for such work.

“The Council is conducting a number of projects aimed at increasing women’s participation in the economy, and also conducts regular research, the data of which we are ready to share, and in general we are ready to help organize similar work in the BRICS countries,” she said.

According to her, such projects of the EWF Council as “Development of Women’s Entrepreneurship” and “Women’s Cooperation in International Trade” are carried out with the active participation of the all-Russian public organization of small and medium-sized enterprises “OPORA RUSSIA” and the Russian Export Center, which makes it possible to put women’s business on a professional basis and provide it, including financial and marketing support. Business missions organized by the Council are aimed at promoting women's business and strengthening international relations.

“There is good experience of such cooperation with China and Uzbekistan,” Karelova said, “it can be successfully extended to other countries.”

In addition, the Council’s portfolio includes a number of educational programs in which women from such BRICS countries as India, Brazil, China, Egypt, etc. already participate. In total, over the past three years, representatives of 31 countries and 78 regions of Russia.

Karelova emphasized that thanks to the support of women's entrepreneurship in Russia over three years (from 2021 to 2024), the share of women in Russian business has increased from 32% to 41%. At the same time, the mood of women has changed - now, according to surveys by the EWF Council, 45% of women would like to open their own business, while in 2006 this figure was only 3%. At the same time, as the study of the Women's Entrepreneurship Index conducted by the Council shows, in 2023 it reached a record value of 73.7 points.

— The Council of the Eurasian Women’s Forum is open for cooperation. I am confident that the exchange of experience and practices will be useful not only for the female audience, but in general will have a beneficial effect on strengthening interaction with the BRICS countries, Karelova said.