Access Bank, IFC Empowers Women at ‘Womenpreneur Pitchathon’

Nume Ekeghe

In its continuous bid at empowering women, Access Bank in collaboration with the International Finance Corporation (IFC) has empowered women in its season 4 Womenpreneur Pitch-a-thon with cash grants worth over N14 million and a mini-MBA training for its selected candidates 

Mobaby Care Nigeria emerged as the grand prize winner of N5 million while the second and third winners carted with N4million and N3 million respectively with other consolation prizes
Launched in 2019, the Womenpreneur Pitch-a-thon programme is the first women-in-business support initiative by Access Bank’s W Initiative tailored to support women-led businesses with grants, informative tools to help grow their businesses.

Speaking at the closing ceremony event in Lagos recently,  the Managing Director/CEO, Access Bank, Nigeria, Mr. Roosevelt Ogbonna, has stressed the need for Nigerian businesses to shift their business model from profit-oriented to providing net societal benefits.

He urged the candidates selected to utilised the bank’s resources availed to them aside from the mini-MBA training given to them, in partnership with the IFC. This, if done, according to him, would push the country’s gross domestic product higher and lead to the improved well-being of the entire population and their respective businesses.

According to him, “I recalled when I was in law school, one of the things that we talked about in class was the purpose of a business. Why are business started, in the earliest years of corporation it had to be that you provided net societal benefit. You have to prove to the queen that when they set up this business the society will be better off for it and you have to demonstrate that what you offered as an institution would make the world a better place for your economy.

“We ask ourselves continually how do we make the world a better place, make the right impact in the markets and communities that we serve. If you look at the SDGs, particularly goal 2,3,4, 5, 10, and 17, they speak about human existence.”