THE Canadian government has extended a P320 million worth of grant to finance the “Great Women 2” project implemented by the Philippine Commission on Women (PCW).
Canadian Ambassador to the Philippines Neil Reeder and National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) Director General Arsenio M. Balisacan signed on Wednesday the memorandum of understanding for the six-year project.
The Great Women 2 project or the Supporting Women’s Economic Empowerment Project aims to benefit 11,500 woman-entrepreneurs nationwide.
“It is important to recognize the role of woman entrepreneurs in economies around the world, including the Philippines and Canada,” Reeder said on Wednesday.
The project will focus on helping woman entrepreneurs in the food and textile sectors. Once the project is completed in 2020, the beneficiaries are expected to see at least a 30 percent increase in their annual sales and reinvestment rate of at least 20 percent a year.
Reeder also mentioned that the project is just one of other projects they intend to assist, given that the Philippines was chosen as one of the 25 countries of focus of the Canadian government.
“It shows the recognition of the merits of the Philippine government and non-governmental organizations, the private sectors as partners, and that we can build on what we’ve done in the past and intensify going forward,” Reeder said.
Reeder also mentioned that, apart from being a development focus for Canada, the Philippines has also been included in Canada’s Global Market Action Plan (GMAP).
By being included in the GMAP, the Philippines has also become a trade priority among emerging countries for the Canadian government, he added.
This bodes well for the Great Women 2 project, given that women nationwide will now have the opportunity to have increased chances of importing and/or exporting products to Canada, according to Reeder.
Currently, Reeder said the Philippines imports raw materials, such as cereals, and meat products, like pork, from Canada and exports electrical goods and components.
Balisacan, meanwhile, said a high- level meeting between the two countries recently transpired to discuss a new partnership strategy.
The Neda Chief said the meeting aim to match the country’s development priorities with that of the Canadian government.
Currently, Balisacan said the Philippines’s priorities include poverty reduction, building resiliencies in relation to climate change, and gender empowerment, among others.