Increasing access to loans for women entrepreneurs

The exploitation and management of capital sources entrusted for lending through the Social Policy Bank (SPB) by Women's Unions at all levels has promoted the role of the Union in supporting female members to start businesses, start businesses, and develop the economy.

As a gender-specific socio-political organization, the Women's Union is the unit that receives the most entrusted capital among the four mass organizations.

Since the Secretariat issued Directive No. 40-CT/TW, Conclusion 06/KL-TU and most recently Directive No. 39-CT/TW on improving the effectiveness of social policy credit in the new period, the Vietnam Women's Union has comprehensively directed policy credit activities, especially at the grassroots level, closely coordinating with the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies in implementing policy credit, ensuring that social policy credit capital reaches the right beneficiaries.

The exploitation and management of loan trust sources through the Social Policy Bank have been promoted and implemented effectively. Thereby, the Women's Union at all levels has promoted the role of the Union in supporting female members to have the opportunity to access preferential loans from the Government, helping women confidently start businesses to develop the economy, contributing to effectively implementing the socio-economic development goals of the country.

Women's Unions at all levels have promoted the role of the organization in supporting female members to have access to preferential loans from the Government.

At the Consultation Workshop on the orientation to support women in starting a business in the period of 2026-2035 , Ms. Hoang Thi Hanh, Deputy Director of the Credit Department for the Poor, Vietnam Bank for Social Policies, said that currently, as of October 31, 2024, 4 entrusted socio-political organizations are coordinating with the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies to manage 357,026 billion VND of outstanding policy credit for over 6.8 million households. Of which, the Vietnam Women's Union manages 135,433 billion VND , accounting for 37.93% of the total entrusted outstanding debt and over 53% of the customers borrowing from the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies are women.

Currently, the VBSP has a specific policy for startups and women startups. However, during the process of the Vietnam Women's Union implementing the project to support women startups in the period of 2017 - 2025 (Project 939), women startups can access many lending programs of the VBSP such as lending programs for poor and near-poor households; lending programs for job creation; lending programs for production and business households, traders operating in difficult areas; lending programs for small and medium enterprises, cooperatives, cooperative groups, etc.

Ms. Hoang Thi Hanh, Deputy Director of the Poor Credit Department, Vietnam Bank for Social Policies, speaking at the Workshop

Basically, the programs of the VBSP meet the capital needs of small scale (maximum 100 million), women can easily access to start-up capital, start a business. In the past time, the Women's Union at all levels and the VBSP have also organized many programs to introduce, select, and guide women to access preferential loans.

However, for large-scale start-up projects that require a lot of capital, preferential loans have not yet met the demand and there is no specific program for women starting a business. However, issuing a credit program specifically for women starting a business is considered quite difficult.

To accompany and support women in starting businesses effectively, Ms. Hoang Thi Hanh has advised and proposed solutions for Women's Unions at all levels to promote their role and capacity, coordinate with the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies to implement Project 939 in localities, and mobilize more resources from localities to increase women's access to loans.

At the same time, Ms. Hoang Thi Hanh also suggested that the Vietnam Women's Union and the Drafting Team for the Project "Supporting Women to Start a Business in the 2026-2035 Period" could research and expand the support content related to specific regions and areas such as rural areas, mountainous areas, ethnic minority areas, etc. to have different specific support policies for these subjects.

On the morning of December 3, 2024, the Vietnam Women's Union organized a consultation workshop on strategic orientations to support women in starting businesses for the period 2026-2035 to identify goals, tasks and solutions to support women in starting businesses to meet the requirements in the new situation.

The workshop was attended by representatives of ministries, branches, experts, startup consultants, organizations and units accompanying the Vietnam Women's Union, women entrepreneurs and representatives of the Women's Union at all levels.

The valuable information and useful sharing of the workshop will be an important basis for the Vietnam Women's Union to continue researching and adjusting solutions and activities to support and promote women's startups in an increasingly innovative and creative direction, keeping up with the strong development of science and technology, digital transformation, green transformation, and sustainable development of the country.

Source: https://phunuvietnam.vn/cac-cap-hoi-lhpn-phat-huy-vai-tro-nang-luc-phoi-hop-cung-nhcsxh-ho-tro-phu-nu-khoi-nghiep-20241203171442867.htm