Financial Literacy Imperative for Success of Women Entrepreneurship

Introduction

Entrepreneurship is an incredible potency that should ideally utilize all human capital for the economic growth and sustainable development of the country. This can happen only by integrating a gender perspective (Baporikar, 2016), wherein both men and women as entrepreneurs are equally involved and contribute. This means that women enterprises must also succeed and grow as much as their counterpart enterprises do. Entrepreneurship refers to an innovative process of vision, change and creation, which requires the application of energy and passion in the quest to implement new ideas (Kuratko, 2014). The process hinges on the individual’s experience and personal traits, the desire to achieve one’s own goals, the ability to identify opportunities and putting together the resources necessary for achieving such goals and opportunities (Scarborough & Cornwall, 2016). Women entrepreneurship has become central to the economic development of nations because of its contribution towards poverty alleviation, gender equality and the creation of productive work (Vita, Mari, & Poggesi, 2014). According to Brush, Carter, Gatewood, Greene and Hart (2006), the biggest percentage of businesses that are growing in the world are mostly owned by women. Keley, Singer, and Herrington (2015), however note that women entrepreneurs are almost only half of the population of male entrepreneurs. Gender gaps through income inequalities in households and limited active involvement of women in profitable labour still exist in Africa (Tettey, Ackah, & Asuman, 2018), hence in order to achieve a holistic growth and a strong private sector, it is vital to address the source and nature of the gender gaps.

Africa is still struggling to develop entrepreneurial competencies and articulating real strategies to transform resources into profits. The development of entrepreneurial skills is vital in order to transform resources to achieve growth (Edoho, 2015). This can be enhanced through a holistic approach including providing information that may lead to positive results. Information is perceived as important for every business model, therefore properly using this information to pursue entrepreneurial targets will ensure the achievement and successful growth in enterprises (Baporikar, 2018). Baughn, Chua, and Neupert (2006) note that women have the potential and talent that can be used to drive growth in different areas and contexts but these still remain unexploited. Consequently, women‐owned businesses still struggle to grow and they are not as profitable as those owned by men (Brush et al., 2006). In developing economies, this problem is even more aggravated by lack of financial management skills in the enterprises. Therefore, if productive entrepreneurship is to emerge, governments, the society and business associations need to involve more women in entrepreneurship by playing an enabling role so that new business ventures have a higher chance of growing (Brixiova, 2010).