Women collectives under the auspices of Partnership for Advancing Women in Economic Development, (PAWED), have decried the alleged low allocation to women in the proposed 2024 budget set for passage.

The group supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, in a statement yesterday in Abuja, said that the 2024 budget inadequately caters to the economic development of women describing it as ‘grossly inadequate’.

Led by National President, Network of Entrepreneural Women, Chief Funmilayo Arowoogun, they say the proposed 2024 budget of ₦12.59 billion to women, when compared to ₦ 78 billion in 2023, showed an 82% reduction at a time the government is promoting renewed investment in women’s economic empowerment under its Renewed Hope Agenda.

‘’Women representatives came together to spend one full day reviewing the 2024 proposed budget estimates for women’s economic empowerment.

“While we are happy to note the allocation of 12.59 billion naira for women’s economic empowerment projects across board in the 2024 estimates, we observe that this allocation represents an 82% reduction from the 2023 allocation of ₦72 billion.

“We are even more concerned to note that we see only 99 WEE, (Women Economic Empowerment), projects in the 2024 budget compared to 164 projects in the 2022 budget.”

According to her, ‘’Women representatives came together to spend one full day reviewing the 2024 proposed budget estimates for women’s economic empowerment.

PAWED including the Association of Women Enterprenuers (AWITA), the National Association of Women Entrepreneurs (NAWE), and the National Council for Women Societies, (NCWS), among others, observed that that compared with the 2023 provisions, which had over 442 WEE projects for women, youth and others, the 2024 proposed has only 107 such projects.

‘’Even when the ₦12.57 billion allocation to the WEE lines targeting women, youth and others is added to the ₦12.59 allocation for women-only WEE projects, the 2024 allocation for WEE remains the lowest since 2019.

“Less than one per cent of the 2024 budgetary capital allocation is dedicated to women’s economic empowerment. In 2023, almost 2% of the annual capital budget was allocated to WEE, they lamented.

Mrs Arowoogun said, the group also recognised the nation’s tight fiscal space, ‘’we believe that reduced funding for WEE will impact negatively on the achievement of government’s WEE targets.’’ She added

PAWED therefore, appeal to the federal government for an upward review, more gender-disaggregated and beneficiary specific review of the 2024 budget allocation for WEE so that the laudable commitments of the Renewed Hope Agenda can be achieved.

“Together, we can work towards a more inclusive and economically empowered Nigeria”, they said.