Toolkit to help women start their entrepreneurial journey

By Erica Lee

To mark International Women’s Day on March 8th, the Women Entrepreneurs Business Council (WEBC) launched a new Start up toolkit to assist women in Fiji who want to start their entrepreneurial journey.

According to the WEBC Coordinator Fiona Dansey, the Council designed the online toolkit to be a one-stop-shop and step-by-step guide for women to access information, advice, and procedures to help them formally register their business.  The toolkit has been funded through a grant from the Fiji Women’s Fund.

“While there are some websites in Fiji providing similar information, our toolkit has collated information from various sources and provides practical advice in simple language that women at all stages of business can easily understand.”

She added with so many Fijians out of work due to the pandemic, women had increasingly turned to starting small businesses such as catering, to help feed their families.

“While many of these new businesses would like to become registered, the process can be very daunting and not getting the right information can discourage entrepreneurs,” she said.

Fiona added that being unregistered also limited their ability to access capital and opportunities such as government concessional loans and grants.

The toolkit features information on business registration, taxation compliance, Occupational, Health and Safety requirements, education levy information, labour laws and other pertinent compliance certifications that businesses require.  WEBC says it has already tested the tool kit and has received positive feedback.  For more information on the Start-up tool kit, please visit their website: https://bit.ly/3u4okUb

 

About WEBC

The Women Entrepreneurs Business Council was established (through a partnership between FCEF ILO Bureau for Employers Activities ACT/EMP-Norway Partnership) in September 2013. WEBC is a subset of the Fiji Commerce & Employers Federation and part of its nine Councils. WEBC’s primary objective is to ensure that the voice of businesswomen in the formal and informal sectors is heard at the policy level.