VIENTIANE – Thirty-five (35) young women entrepreneurs from across the 10 ASEAN Member States and Japan convened in Lao PDR to discuss challenges and opportunities related to innovation and sustainability in their enterprises. The Roundtable Discussion of Young Women Entrepreneurs in ASEAN and Japan, held on November 5-6 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, was organized by the ASEAN-Japan Centre in partnership with the ASEAN Youth Organization, with support from the ASEAN Coordinating Committee on MSMEs, ASEAN ACCESS, the East Asia Business Advisory Council, and the Lao Businesswomen Association.
The discussions at the Roundtable served as a pivotal platform for addressing the key barriers young women entrepreneurs face in today’s fast-evolving business landscape, particularly in achieving both innovation and sustainability in their ventures. The program aims to identify practical solutions to enhance the resilience and competitiveness of women-led enterprises, paving the way for greater economic empowerment and collaboration between ASEAN and Japan.
The discussions centred on two key themes: Enhancing Connectivity and Enhancing Resilience. For connectivity, participants explored ways to improve financial inclusion, encourage gender-smart investments, and build digital skills and financial literacy to ensure safe participation in the digital economy. Under resilience, they addressed closing the gender divide in MSME ownership and promoting sustainability practices that empower women to lead socially and environmentally responsible businesses.
The participants also joined site visits to two leading women-owned enterprises in Lao PDR: Enterprise & Development Consultants Co., Ltd. (EDC) and Leuxay Construction Co., Ltd. These visits offered invaluable insights into the operational strategies and best practices of successful women-owned businesses in Lao PDR, facilitating knowledge exchange and opening potential avenues for future collaboration.
The event raised the challenges of accessing grants and loans for women entrepreneurs due to administrative regulations, competition against bigger companies, and lack of flexibility of funding solutions. They also raised the challenges of establishing basic cybersecurity hygiene, identifying digital solutions that are appropriate for their needs and ensuring that employees have the necessary skill that can respond to the rapid evolution of technology, and ability to protect their customers. The participants also called for more resilient women entrepreneur networks to support each other as a key strategy to close the gender gap towards women business ownership.
The full findings of the discussions will be launched in a report at the ASEAN-Japan Young Women Entrepreneurs’ Summit to be held in Kuala Lumpur, on February 13, 2025.
The ASEAN-Japan Centre is an intergovernmental organization established in 1981 dedicated to promoting trade, investment, tourism, and people-to-people exchanges between ASEAN and Japan.
