10,000 women trained through Goldman Sachs

10,000 women website

Goldman Sachs announced this week 12 new partnerships under its 10,000 Women Initiative scheme. In this scheme that started in March 2008, European and American business schools work together with non-for-profit organisations and business school in developing countries. Together they educate female entrepreneurs in countries such as Brazil, China and India to improve their business and management skills.

Goldman Sachs provides money, 100 Million US dollars, as well as actual mentoring hours through its employees. Right now almost 6,000 women can be educated under the scheme. Women are the target group of Goldman Sachs to be educated in the program, ’since among the 50 major business schools in Africa, only 2,600 women are currently enrolled in local MBA programs - a continent of 900 million people. Investing in education for women may have the highest social return of any investment, when one considers the range of income and health outcomes for such women and their families. Investing in girls’ education leads to increased wages for individuals as well as faster economic growth for a country.’ (source: 10,000 Women website)

Examples of women educated in the scheme can be found on the website, such as Ibironke Domingo Yewande, who started IN NAIJA IT Solutions Ltd., an information communication technology company, a little over a year ago. Domingo would like to hone her managerial and entrepreneurial skills.