Jo-Ann talks with Sana, a social entrepreneur, author of “Invisible Women of the Middle East, ” Founding Director of WomenPreneur & CoFounder of Womenquake. After traveling extensively for four years working and covering stories of women in different countries around the globe, started focusing on stimulating the economy through female entrepreneurship by providing a holistic approach to equipping women with the skills, knowledge and confidence they need to succeed their businesses.
During her travels, Sana Afouaiz found herself asking: How does one empower women in a sustainable way? Afouaiz researched several models, and then founded the Womenpreneur Initiative, which offers services on entrepreneurship and business development. In this episode, Sana shares the story behind her social enterprise, her thoughts on women entrepreneurs as a at catalyst in the MENA region and much more. Sana states, “Ensuring women access to business opportunities is critical to economic prosperity and sustainable development of communities. Several researches indicate that lack of role models, low self-confidence, lack of technical expertise, and limited access to appropriate networking and funding continue to be the main challenges facing women entrepreneurs. Our Professional Entrepreneurial Programme was established to fill this gap by supporting women entrepreneurs grow scalable businesses, accompany them through the process of delivering their initiatives and take their leadership to the next level. We help them by increasing their access to knowledge and opportunities. We create a space for them to expand their network, internationalize and reach new markets; and we break the stereotypes that try to label them as the “other.” Listen to more from Sana.