Women could generate $10 trillion by 2030

On a recent trip to India, Melinda French-Gates, co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation, found that the proportion of Indian women with digital bank accounts rose from 26 per cent to 78 per cent – from a quarter to more than three quarters – in the ten years to 2021. And those accounts aren’t empty. $15 billion-worth of government backing for affordable credit schemes for women has catalysed an extra $90 billion from other sources. Globally, 17 per cent of women in developing countries are categorised as early-stage entrepreneurs, and 40 per cent want to start a business. Gates has issued an appeal in the Economist urging policymakers gathering in Washington next week for the annual World Bank and IMF meetings to focus on the power of gender equality as a generator of growth. “I’ve learned that there will always be people who insist that now is not the time to talk about gender equality,” she writes. Which makes now as good a time as any. In the hunt for sustainable growth at a time of war and accelerating climate change, who wouldn’t turn to investments (in women’s economic power) that the Eurasia Group says could grow the world economy by 7 per cent – equivalent to $10 trillion – by 2030?