The Association of Nigerian Women in Business Network (ANWBN) has charged women to deploy technology to scale up their businesses and engineer organic transformation of the small-scale sector to reach their maximum potential.

Speaking yesterday at the body’s yearly summit in Lagos, National Coordinator of ANWBN, Angela Ajala, urged women to also utilise the strength of over 75 cluster associations in the group with a membership spread of about five million women across Nigeria.

Encouraging the women, Angela said: “The theme ‘Future-Ready Entrepreneurs: Skill up to Scaleup’ speaks to where we are headed and the urgency of the task ahead. The opportunities are boundless, but only if we are equipped with the skills, the mindset and the resilience to seize them.

“We must remember that scaling up requires more than passion, it demands knowledge, expertise and the continuous pursuit of growth.”

It requires building strong networks and forging partnerships that will enable us to transcend limitations. We must also embrace technology, innovation and adaptability as these are no longer optional tools but essential elements of our future success,” she said.

Delivering the keynote address, chairperson of the 2024 summit committee, Hansatu Adegbite, admonished the women to be consistent and continually uphold their business value and agenda. “One of the mistakes we make as Africans to focus more on education but right now in the labour market, skills have become the core medicine of the future. If you give up, you phase out and become irrelevant,” she noted.

Chairperson of the event, wife of Ogun State governor, Mrs Bamidele Abiodun, emphasised that the role of women has long been recognised as essential to sustainable development, which is why the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) place great emphasis on women empowerment, gender equality and poverty alleviation.