UN Women hosts roundtable on challenges and solutions to women’s involvement in export and trade

To commemorate the International Day of Rural Women on 15 October 2024, UN Women Moldova organized the roundtable event "Women in Export: Pathways to the Global Market." The roundtable featured a dialogue between representatives of state institutions, international organizations and donors, business associations and women entrepreneurs. During the event, UN Women Moldova presented the findings of a study on women's economic empowerment in trade and export promotion undertaken by Gateway & Partners Moldova. At the same time, participants discussed potential initiatives, collaborations and concrete strategies to strengthen the exports of women-led businesses.

"Today we mark the International Day of Rural Women, and we set out to discuss the challenges that women entrepreneurs have, including in rural areas, in exporting products and accessing global markets,” said Dominika Stojanoska, UN Women’s Moldova Country Representative, during the roundtable. “This study is the first step towards future initiatives that will be implemented over several years, aiming to capitalize on and strengthen the potential of women in business, from increasing the number of women entrepreneurs to increasing the presence of women in exports. These efforts are not singular, and they are not only in line with the Sustainable Development Goals but also with Moldova's accession process to the European Union because gender mainstreaming in trade aligns with the European integration agenda."

According to data from the State Tax Service, the number of women-owned exporting companies in Moldova increased to 60.2 per cent between 2023 and 2013. This growth exceeded the overall growth rate of exporting companies, indicating that initiatives successfully supported female entrepreneurship. The data also revealed an encouraging 54.6 per cent growth rate of women in the top managerial roles of exporting companies, such as CEO or general manager, between 2023 and 2013. However, over ten years, the share of exporting companies led by women has remained relatively constant, at just over 28 per cent, even as the total number of exporting companies has increased.

Women-owned companies have seen encouraging growth in terms of turnover and the value of exports. At the same time, the wage gap between women and men in exporting companies also increased, from 1,160 lei to 1,430 lei. Although the increase rate of this gap (23.3 per cent) is lower than that of the overall wage increase for women, it remains significant, highlighting that wage inequality is a persistent problem.

The number of women-led retail companies has increased, reaching 3,881 in 2023 compared to 1,910 in 2013, reflecting women’s sustained, long-term entrepreneurial involvement. However, analyzing the salary gap between women and men in the retail sector, the study found that it almost doubled in the analyzed period, from 790.40 lei to 1,453.87 lei. While women's average salaries have seen a significant increase, the fact that the wage gap has widened suggests an even more pronounced increase in the salaries of their male counterparts.

The study also identified the following challenges faced by women in trade and exports:

• Access to finance: Moldovan entrepreneurs face significant difficulties accessing financial products tailored to their needs.
• Training and skills development: There is a lack of women-specific training and mentoring programmes in international trade, export market entry strategies and global supply chain management.
• Gender stereotypes: Women face harmful social norms that impose traditional roles on them and devalue their contributions to the economy.
• Policy and regulatory challenges: Although there are general policies to promote entrepreneurship, gender-specific support mechanisms are lacking.
• Lack of networks: Existing business networks are largely male-dominated or lack sufficient coverage or resources to include women effectively, especially those in rural areas.
• Lack of disaggregated data: More comprehensive data on women's economic participation, especially in the trade and export sectors, is urgently needed. This would help chart the direction of sectoral policies.

The study, developed by UN Women in collaboration with Gateway & Partners Moldova, was based on secondary research and data provided by the State Tax Service, the National Bureau of Statistics and data available at the European and international levels.

Several women entrepreneurs and beneficiaries of UN Women's economic empowerment programmes shared their experiences during the roundtable. Nadejda Hadjivu, the founder of NutriHolding, spoke about the difficulty of obtaining certificates, as well as the high costs. "When it comes to a small production, people want quality products, and it is very difficult to have a cheap product because you need quality machinery,” she said. “The high-performance technological lines are costly, the grants fail to cover them and the interest rate is very high for the loans you want to obtain."

Victoria Rusnac, the founder of Honey House, shared a success story in the export industry. "For two years now, we have been successfully exporting our natural honey mixed with organic berries. We started exporting to Japan, and here we are talking about the importance of supporting producers because we managed to export to Japan thanks to a fair organized by UN Women,” she said. “We built a new production section and obtained three more grants from the Organisation for the Development of Entrepreneurship (ODA) to support internationalization. We produce a ton of honey in an hour and employ six women. Their schedule is flexible because, in our society, women are still the ones in charge of the children. And women, in order to develop, face a series of domestic obstacles and many stereotypes."

To respond to these challenges, UN Women Moldova will initiate collaborative actions with relevant actors to support women's economic empowerment in trade and export promotion. The aim is to catalyze a transformative shift towards inclusive economic growth by increasing the participation of Moldovan women in these sectors. UN Women Moldova proposes an ambitious strategy focused on harnessing the potential of women in trade and export, with two priority areas of intervention:

1. Strengthening policies and institutional support for women in trade and export through data collection and analysis, strengthening the capacities of institutions at the local level, increasing dialogue between stakeholders, implementing regulatory reforms and increasing women’s access to finance.
2. Increasing the resilience and competitiveness of women-led businesses by developing women’s digital skills and e-commerce and improving their access to markets, networks, different resources and information.

The event, organized by UN Women and financially supported by the Government of Sweden, was held to support Women's Economic Empowerment, one of UN Women's strategic actions in Moldova.