Women's Enterprise
We're encouraging more young women to have ideas and make them happen. Our campaign celebrates the fantastic achievements of women and girls who have turned their ideas into reality.
Our Girls! Make Your Mark campaign launched on Women's Enterprise Day 2006, during Enterprise Week. It was set up to respond to the disparity between men and women when it comes to setting up a business.
Margaret Hodge, the Industry and Regions Minister, announced plans for thousand female entrepreneurs to be recruited to help and inspire more women to set up their own business.
This army of businesswomen activists will provide a national network of women helping women across the country and will work with the new Task Force for Women’s Enterprise.
More about Girls! Make Your Mark
Girls! Make Your Mark Awards
We have launched these new awards with handbag.com to celebrate Britain’s female entrepreneurs and encourage more to take the plunge. Find out more about the Girls! Make Your Mark Awards.Women's Enterprise Day 2008
We are busy preparing for Women's Enterprise Day 2008, which will take place during Enterprise Week (17th -23rd November).Women's Enterprise Day will see women's organisations from all over the UK hosting events and activities to profile successful female entrepreneurs and inspire new female talents with the confidence and know-how to do the same.
You can find out what happened on Women's Enterprise Day 2007, as well as keep up to date the latest news from the campaign, on the women's enterprise blog.
The facts on women’s enterprise
Did you know that men start up 150,000 more businesses a year than women?1 Here are some more interesting facts about women's enterprise.
- If the UK had the same rates of female entrepreneurship as the US we could have around three quarters of a million more businesses;
- If we get more women into the economy UK productivity could be boosted by up to £23 billion, worth 2 per cent of GDP;
- Women-owned businesses contribute about £60 billion to the economy (Gross Value Added);
- Men are still almost twice as likely to start businesses as women (GEM Report);
- If women started businesses at the same rate as men, the UK would see 150,000 more businesses per annum;
- Most of the one million self employed women in the UK are in the service sector. (Labour Force Survey); and,
- On average, the interest rate charged on loans to female-owned businesses is 1 per cent higher than the rate charged to male-owned businesses (2.9 vs 1.9 percentage points over base; Source: A Report on the 2004 UK Survey of SME Finances, University of Warwick).
- When we asked a small group of female entrepreneurs recently their inspiration/ role model for starting a business four out of ten of them said their role model was another female entrepreneur. (Provisional findings from a survey of women entrepreneurs in science, engineering, construction and technology conducted by the UK Resource Centre for Women in Science, Engineering and Technology and PROWESS).
Notes
1 Source: GEM report 2004 (Global Entrepreneurship Monitor)