Entrepreneurship Policies through a Gender Lens

Sri Lanka

By Nadeera Ranabahu, University of Canterbury

Background

Sri Lanka’s National Policy Framework for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprise (SME) Development (2015) has a limited focus on gender. The policy vision is "to create a significant number of globally competitive, dynamic, innovative, technologically-driven, eco-friendly and sustainable SMEs that contribute greatly to the national economic development" (Ministry of Industry and Commerce: Sri Lanka, 2015). The mission of the National SME Policy is to stimulate growth of SMEs. In 2016, an action plan was developed to implement the National SME Policy by the Ministry of Industry and Commerce in collaboration with other key government institutions (Ministry of Industry and Commerce: Sri Lanka, 2016). These two documents – the National SME Policy and the action plan – stress that women’s entrepreneurship is a policy area in need of attention, alongside green growth, sustainability, creating industrial villages, and SME cluster development. Nevertheless, of the six policy intervention areas identified in Sri Lanka’s policy documents,1 only three include activities to enhance women’s entrepreneurship. These three areas are: enabling environment, entrepreneurial culture and skill development, and access to finance. There is, however, evidence of gender-specific challenges in other policy areas such as access to markets and technology, and innovation (Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 2015). Despite this, explicit reference to activities that support women-led SMEs include only: 1) strengthening women’s chambers of commerce and rewarding women entrepreneurs, 2) developing special training programmes targeted toward women, and 3) providing concessionary bank loans.

From a feminist perspective, the limited policy focus on women raises the question of whether SME policies have missed an opportunity to address the gender gap in the Sri Lankan context. Sri Lanka, for example, has a 0.680 score in the Gender Gap Index, and is ranked 102^th out of 153 countries (World Economic Forum, 2020). Sri Lanka’s labour force participation rate for men is 77.1% compared to just 38.2% for women (World Economic Forum, 2020). Women’s self-employment statistics are not that different to the overall employment figures, with only one quarter of ventures in Sri Lanka being owned by women (Department of Census and Statistics: Sri Lanka, 2015). Hence, mitigating long-term economic consequences of the gender gap requires public policies – including policies on entrepreneurship – having gender-sensitive practices, structures and norms, and creating a supportive business environment.

Policy issue: Regulatory environment and access to entrepreneurship support

Sri Lankan women entrepreneurs have limited business support and face institutional challenges when they start and manage their businesses (Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 2015). For example, women lack knowledge on legal rights and protections. They are unaware of the process of registering their titles to land, lack awareness about legal protection for business owners, and are unsure about the process for obtaining trade licenses (Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 2015; United Nations: Sri Lanka, 2015). Fear of compliance with tax and other statutory liabilities further limit women from registering their businesses (Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 2015).

Women, in certain areas of the country, lack property rights. Although general law provides matrimonial property rights to women, the customary Thesawalamai property law, which is the traditional law of the Tamil inhabitants of the Jaffna peninsula, requires women to get the written consent of their husbands when selling, mortgaging or disposing of acquired property (United Nations: Sri Lanka, 2015). This is particularly challenging in a post-war context where husbands are missing or when there is no written evidence such as a death certificate (United Nations: Sri Lanka, 2015).

In addition, lack of transportation affects women’s economic engagement. Due to the lack of adequate transport options, women entrepreneurs find it difficult to travel to business development training programmes in main cities (Attygalle et al., 2014; UNDP, 2016). Lack of safety in public transport, as women often experience harassment (Solotaroff et al., 2017; United Nations: Sri Lanka, 2015), leaves them with limited options. Women are also less likely to own vehicles such as tractors, three-wheelers, and bicycles and usually spend more time and money in transporting materials or finished goods (UNDP, 2016).

Women, especially in rural areas, have limited access to business information. They are highly dependent on their immediate social network and have limited access to markets or external networks (Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 2015). Similarly, women are less likely to be members of a trade association or business chamber (Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 2015). Thus, women business owners are less aware of new initiatives, such as eco-tourism, that provide opportunities for growth in emerging sectors (Solotaroff et al., 2017). Women’s lack of access to information and networks also restricts their ability to recognise and take advantage of market needs, market gaps and the demand for products (Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 2015; United Nations: Sri Lanka, 2015).

Regardless of these realities, Sri Lankan policy interventions and activities assume that women, similar to men, would benefit from the overall development of the entrepreneurial eco-system. Hence, although activities are specified in current SME policy documents (i.e. special training programmes, rewarding the best women entrepreneurs, supporting women’s chambers of commerce, and providing concessionary bank loans for women) they are not sufficiently holistic, nor are they sufficiently embedded within institutionalised structures and processes to bring about significant change.

Conclusions and recommendations

The contextually embedded nature of women’s entrepreneurship in Sri Lanka suggests that, in order to promote women’s business ownership, current policies need to account for normative, regulative and cultural factors. The complex nature of women’s entrepreneurship also highlights the need for cross-sectoral support structures. More specifically, at regional levels, the overall business environment and support structures available for women entrepreneurs need to be improved. Hence, the following recommendations are provided.

Recommendations for Sri Lanka

• Provide access for women to legal clinics, community level legal services, awareness programmes on business rights and protections, and legal consultation services in collaboration with national or regional organisations (e.g., women’s chambers of commerce, universities).

• Promote women’s access to training programmes and entry into rapid-growth sectors by establishing business incubator or accelerator services associated with regionally-based institutions such as Vidatha Resource Centres.

• Promote access to market information, financial literacy and business mentoring support for women entrepreneurs located in remote areas through regionally based institutions (e.g. women’s chambers of commerce, Vidatha Resource Centres, and divisional secretariats) and through the use of technology-based solutions.

References

Attygalle, K., D. Hirimuthugodage, S. Madurawala, A. Seneratne, A. Wijesinha and C. Edirisinge (2014), “Female entrepreneurship and the role of business development services in promoting small and medium women entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka”, The Institute of Policy Studies of Sri Lanka and Oxfam International Sri Lanka, http://www.ips.lk/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/female_entrepreneurship.pdf.

Department of Census and Statistics: Sri Lanka (2015), “Non-agricultural economic activities in Sri Lanka: Economic census 2013/2014 (Listing phase)”, Ministry of Policy Planning, Economic Affairs, Child Youth and Cultural Affairs, http://www.statistics.gov.lk/Economic/Non%20agri.pdf.

Ministry of Industry and Commerce: Sri Lanka (2015), “National policy framework for small & medium enterprise (SME) development”, http://www.industry.gov.lk/web/images/pdf/framew_eng.pdf.

Ministry of Industry and Commerce: Sri Lanka (2016), “Action plan: National policy framework small & medium enterprise (SME) development”, http://www.industry.gov.lk/web/images/pdf/gg.pdf.

Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry: Sri Lanka (2015), “Fostering women’s entrepreneurship in the SME sector in Sri Lanka”, Policy Advocacy Working Group, http://www.wcicsl.lk/publications/WCIC%20Policy%20Advoacy%20Working%20Paper.pdf.

Solotaroff, J. L., G. Joseph and A.T. Kuriakose (2017), “Overview: Getting to work: unlocking women’s potential in Sri Lanka’s labour force” Directions in development—Countries and regions, World Bank Publishing, Washington DC, https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/28660.

UNDP (2016), “Trade Winds of Change: Women Entrepreneurs on the Rise in South Asia: Background country study-Sri Lanka”, https://www.asia-pacific.undp.org/content/rbap/en/home/library/sustainable-development/trade-winds-of-change.html.

United Nations: Sri Lanka (2015), “Mapping of Socio-Economic Support Services to Female Headed Households in the Northern Province of Sri Lanka”, United Nations, Colombo, http://lk.one.un.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/Mapping-of-Socio-Economic-Support-Services-to-Female-Headed-Households-in-the-Northern-Province-of-Sri-Lanka.pdf.

World Economic Forum (2020), “Insight report: The global gender gap report 2020”, http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_GGGR_2020.pdf.