March 7, 2016
Making the Case for Women: The Business of Inclusion

By: Shamarukh Mohiuddin, Director, Economic Empowerment Program, U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation and Karen Newman, Senior Consultant, SDG Fund

For this year’s International Women’s Day Forum, The Business of Inclusion: Global Prosperity through Women and Girls Empowerment, we’re proud to partner with the United Nations and its SDG Fund to share the word of how the private sector plays a critical role in achieving gender parity.

When women’s role in the labor market is identical to men’s, the global economy gets a big boost. Big enough, in fact, to add $28 trillion to global GDP by 2025, according to a new McKinsey report. 2025 isn’t so far away, though, and strategic partnerships are going to be necessary for laying the groundwork to achieve this progress towards gender parity.

That’s where the U.S. Chamber Foundation Corporate Citizenship Center (CCC) comes in. CCC is committed to providing the resources and opportunities that create the conditions for multi-sector stakeholder collaboration to advance women’s economic empowerment. The International Women’s Day Forum is one example of the type of events we hold, year round, to encourage dialogue around the business role in developing solutions to society’s biggest challenges.

CCC also works to amplify private sector initiatives that give women the tools to access economic opportunity. Businesses of in multiple sectors serve as champions for women on a daily basis. Companies like Walmart and Qualcomm invest in women-owned businesses and encourage entrepreneurship at every stage of the value chain. Intel and Amway provide women and girls access to education, life-changing skills, and technology. These businesses and others realize the economic imperative of investing in women and girls.  

This year, there’s an even more pressing reason to highlight the critical role of business: the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). These 17 global goals seek to transform the world and change countless lives for the better, and the private sector can be a pivotal partner in addressing these global challenges.

More importantly, with our partner the SDG Fund, a Multi-Donor Agency and Cooperation Mechanism, established by UNDP on behalf of the UN system, we have been able to recognize the critical role that women play in development and that women must be at the heart of any future development efforts. Broadly speaking, the SDG's will have a greater emphasis on environmental, economic, and social sustainability than their predecessor, the Millennium Development Goals. This allows for fresh thinking and hope that these new targets will ignite greater interest and commitment to designing programs that tackle the multi-dimensions of poverty.

As a multi-donor agency, the SDG Fund is developing innovative ways to build synergies not only with the private sector, but by designing programs that focus on inclusive growth, food security and water and sanitation. Equally important, as the first mechanism to achieve the SDG’s, the Fund has already initiated programs in 21 pilot countries and has embed sustainability, gender equality and partnerships as critical cross-cutting issues. All SDG Fund programs mainstream gender into their implementation and monitoring plans and work to devise promising practices to empower women and create opportunities for more secure livelihoods. For example, in countries like Bangladesh and Ethiopia where women often lag behind in economic opportunities and access to basic financial services, the Fund is working with several UN agencies to provide programs that can offer a integrated approach to empower women in their communities.

On March 7-8, The Business of Inclusion will explore how the private sector is leading the way in creating a more inclusive world. It’s not just a high-level conversation about goals, though. We’ll have deep-dive workshops that give participants the opportunity to dig in on critical issues around women’s empowerment, such as education and the skills gap, financial inclusion, maternal and child heath, and more.

Join CCC and the SDG Fund next week to be a part of the conversation, with hashtag #USCCFWomen and @USCCFBiz4Good @SDGFUND.