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Belize has joined five other Caribbean nations in launching the Caribbean Women Entrepreneurs Generating Resilient and Inclusive Trade (GRIT) Project, a four-year, three-million-dollar (CAD) initiative aimed at boosting women-led businesses and enhancing their readiness for international markets. The launch was held today at the Grand Residences & Resort in Belize City, under the joint leadership of the Caribbean Export Development Agency, Global Affairs Canada, and BELTRAIDE. The project will provide training, matching grants, technical assistance, and market access support to help women entrepreneurs in sectors such as agro-processing, artisan goods, digital services, and renewable energy. According to Wayne Elliot, Manager of Technical Programmes at Caribbean Export, the GRIT initiative in Belize will prioritize Indigenous women, rural entrepreneurs, youth, and women with disabilities, ensuring inclusivity in regional trade development.
Wayne Elliot, Technical Programs Manager, Caribbean Export Agency: “So for the project in general, essentially what we want to do is help women entrepreneurs create jobs. We really want to help them increase the amount of digital technologies that they’re using in the business. We want to help them to green their businesses and we do want to help them to get into international markets and Canada is one of the primary ones that we’re going to be targeting. It’s not just a Belizean thing. I think it’s a global shift, it’s a global realization that for far too long women have operated outside of the formal economic channels. We’ve kind of shut them out and that we need to make it right. Women are really some of the best producers around. They really can help us to really achieve the economic resilience that we’re seeking. And so this project financed by the Government of Canada is really looking to work with women entrepreneurs and really help them to achieve some of the objectives, the developmental objectives that they themselves have set. We want to help them to create jobs, we want to help them to export into international markets, we really want to help them to develop strong resilient digital green and connected businesses.”
Adele Catzim-Sanchez, CEO in the Ministry of Human Development, Family Support, and Gender Affairs, underscored the importance of equipping women with the skills and resources to create sustainable businesses and drive community growth.
Adele Catzim Sanchez, CEO, Ministry of Human Development: “From what we’ve heard today, we realize that women’s contribution to the economy helps to grow the GDP of every country. And this is scientifically proven. It’s been studied and so we want to make sure that women’s empowerment, our economic empowerment, is not a side event or we want to make sure that it’s core and central to the development of the entire country. And whether it’s integrating women’s empowerment through energy, through climate change, through finance, through trade, or whatever it is that’s happening in the country we deserve to be a part of it. We deserve to be contributors to whatever it is that we do as priorities for national development. We will help to make sure that development is sustainable. We are the caregivers as well and we multi-task. So all the investments that are put in women has a big multiplier effect on the rest of our community, our families, our villages, the communities, the country and in this case across the region, the Caribbean region.”
The GRIT Project, already launched in Dominica and Saint Lucia, is expected to benefit more than 800 women entrepreneurs directly, while indirectly reaching 10,000 women across the Caribbean through regional training, capacity building, and market intelligence platforms.
English (US) ·