(UN ESCAP Strategic Communications and Advocacy Section)- “Investing in women’s entrepreneurial leadership, and the empowerment of women, is smart economics- which is why women’s empowerment is one of the most important development priorities for the countries of Asia and the Pacifc,” said Dr. Noeleen Heyzer, United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), addressing senior Cambodian policy-makers and women business leaders here today, as part of an official visit to the country. The Under-Secretary-General met with the Royal Cambodian Government’s Minister of Women’s Affairs, Dr. Ing Kantha Phavi, and later joined the Minister on a visit to a local women-owned and operated silk business, speaking with women workers and entrepreneurial leaders from the newly-formed Cambodian Women’s Entrepreneurs Association (CWEA)… Although more than 80% of women and girls over the age of 15 participate in the Cambodian workforce, 82% of these jobs are in the informal sector, and women earn about 70% of men’s wages. It has been estimated by ESCAP that limits on women’s economic participation costs the region, as a whole, nearly US$90 billion each year in lost productivity.
