Three Ghanaian women entrepreneurs have started an investment fund that seeks to support women-led small businesses affected by COVID-19.

Roberta Annan, the Managing Partner of Annan Capital Partners (ACP) has teamed up with Adeline Akufo-Addo Kufuor, the CEO of the Women’s Empowerment & Investment Group and Dentaa Amoateng, the Founder of the GUBA Enterprise to what they describe as enhancing the government’s efforts to provide relief to women-led small businesses.

“Our mandate is to support female-led enterprises, to ensure that more women are aware of and can access the resources necessary to establish and manage their business… As a private sector institution, we believe it is our duty to come together and support our government and people by providing additional and/or, alternative resources where possible,” said Roberta Annan.

The COVID-19 stimulus fund will invest between GHC 15,000 to GHC 30,000 in female-led small and medium enterprises (SME’s). “It is largely an equity-based model. We will provide SME’s with initial funding and based on the profit they make, we take a percentage to channel funds back in order to be re-invested into supporting other SME’s,” Annan explained.

She adds that their particular focus is to invest in businesses that have a sustainability model in their decision-making process and can make a positive impact on the Ghanaian economy.

While the pandemic has evidently had a hard hit on all sectors of the business industry,  only applicants who are able to articulate how COVID-19 has affected their business operations and how they plan on conquering such risks have a shot.
“We felt it prudent, as women in business ourselves to come together to support the government in tackling this crisis because SME’s are the most vulnerable to the impact of COVID-19. A lot of businesses don’t survive on this continent and COVID has made it even worse, so we want to step in to help the best way we know how – woman to woman,” Annan added.

In addition to the capital, the fund provides structure, branding tools, digitisation and expansion support to increase the likelihood of growth and success for businesses that make the cut.

NB : This story was re-written from the Forbes piece here  – Female Entrepreneurs Support Women-Led Small Businesses In Ghana With New Investment Fund .