Women and Development

Enhancing women’s participation in economic development is essential not only for achieving social justice but also for reducing poverty. World wide experience shows clearly that supporting a stronger role for women contributes to economic growth, it improves child survival and overall family health and it reduces fertility thus helping to slow population growth rates. In short investing in women is central to sustainable development. And yet, despite these known returns, women still face many barriers in contributing to and benefiting from development. It is from this backdrop that this essay seeks to describe the ways and means to promote women’s participation in economic development. The essay will begin by defining the concept of economic development, after that it will go into describing the ways and means to promote women’s participation in economic development, in this essay the ways and means will be broken down into five areas, education, health, wage labour, agriculture and natural resource management and financial services. Thereafter a conclusion will be drawn.
The concept of economic development can be taken to mean the sustained, concerted actions of policy makers and communities that promote the standard of living and economic health of a specific area. Economic development can also be referred to as the quantitative and qualitative changes in the economy. Such actions can include multiple areas including development of human capital, critical infrastructure, regional competitiveness, environmental sustainability, social inclusion, health, safety, literacy and other initiatives (Todaro & Smith, 2005).

Education is the most important means of empowering women with the knowledge, skills and self confidence necessary to participate fully in the development process. Education is important for everyone but it is especially significant for girls and women. This is true not only because education is an entry point to other opportunities, but also