By: Kemo Kanyi
The Mayor of Banjul City Council, Rohey Malick Lowe has called for setting up of lending bank to support womenfolk in the Gambia.
She made the call in a recent audio message obtained by this medium. According to her, Gambian women don’t have enough financial power and support they need, but they are very resilient and hardworking, compared to other countries on the African continent.
She suggests that if the authorities want to empower women, the country must establish a lending bank for women like Gambia’s neighbour Senegal already has for its women. Mayor Lowe explains that such a bank demands collateral from women who want to take loans to carry out their business.
“I think it’s time we develop such initiatives for women,” she reiterated.
“Women should also be empowered in the area of procurement or be given the privilege of a quota in the government procurement. This can strengthen the financial muscle of our women so that they can be financially independent,” she emphasized.
Mayor Lowe went on to point out that Gambia’s women gardeners and market vendors lack the necessary resources to cultivate or preserve their produce. Some of the problems, she continues, some gardens lack the source of water, some are without fence, and the products don’t have a viable and standardised market.
Speaking about the preservation of the perishable goods, the BCC Mayor added that market vendors didn’t have support for the establishment of storage facilities to preserve perishable goods if their products were not completely sold out.
She also denounces the importation of products into the Gambian markets that are locally cultivated by Gambian women. Such importers of vegetables, she says do not buy from local women gardeners who wouldn’t have any other means but to sell their produces at loss to prevent them from being perished.
Mayor Lowe suggests that Gambia should have a stakeholder dialogue to develop policies that would demand hotels to buy such products from local cultivators.
