Egypt

<p>The project aims to respond to the COVID crisis and the recent increase in demand for e-commerce due to the lockdowns in most MENA countries and the social distancing requirements that should last longer than the lockdowns. &nbsp;Retail businesses are struggling to find a way to reach customers and retain sales during this crisis.</p><p>The project will aim to support this challenge by offering women-led SMEs in MENA an opportunity to learn, in English, French and Arabic, about the fundamentals of doing business via e-commerce, managing logistics and utilizing digital marketing channels. These e-learnings will be delivered through a short series of webinars and facilitated, interactive online deep dive clinics.</p>

<p>ITC will contribute to an improved job potential through the generation of investment leads with European investors interested in investing into the partner countries of the Special Initiative (SI) for Training and Job Creation, which has been initiated by the Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).</p><p>The overall objective of this project is to bring in non-financial European company investors into a joint project development process aiming to mobilize and to support the realization of private investment in the partner countries of the SI in order to create jobs. These investor companies aim to create sustainable jobs through green and brownfield investments in the target countries. The investment leads faciliated should have a particular potential to create jobs for women and youth.&nbsp;</p>

<p>This project document proposes the establishment and piloting of a blended, non-accredited, vocational and practical training programme concentrated around the fundamentals of exporting and the opportunities resulting from the AfCFTA. This curriculum will be developed by the SME Trade Academy in collaboration with the Afreximbank.</p><p>Local partners, such as trade training institutions will provide support in implementation of the pilot programme in three countries, namely Nigeria, Rwanda and C&ocirc;te d&apos;Ivoire.</p><p>The pilot will involve building local partners&rsquo; capacity to market the training and conduct sessions on a continuous basis, localizing the offering for each national context.</p><p>An <strong><span style="color: rgb(184, 49, 47);">expansion phase</span></strong> has been added to the project involving a further 12 countries. The online training will be opened to all African countries.</p>

<p>The proposed project focuses on supporting businesswomen in the <strong>handicraft</strong> sector in Egypt to sustain and grow their business with a view to contributing actively to the welfare of their families and securing livelihoods.</p><p>The project will help Egyptians women owned small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the<strong>&nbsp;handicraft&nbsp;</strong>sector to<strong>&nbsp;</strong>integrate into domestic and global value chains and access new markets by assisting SMEs to deliver products in accordance with market requirements, improving the capacities of trade support institutions (TSIs) to provide quality business support services to women owned SMEs, and linking SMEs to new markets.</p>

<p>The project will focus its support towards the clothing sector and especially towards three, to be selected, sub-sectors. Early analysis and stakeholder feedback suggest to work in denim, knitwear and men&rsquo;s shirts. A maximum of 35 enterprises will be directly supported. The project will also support newly created enterprises under the &ldquo;Your job next door&rdquo; initiative. Its core institutional partner organisation will be the Ready-made Garments Export Council. The project will also seek to work with the Textile Export Council, the Egyptian Exporters&rsquo; Association (ExpoLink), the Egyptian Association for Training and Research Services for Ready-made Garments and Textiles (TrainTex) and the Fashion Design Centre. The final TISI selection is subject to an institutional assessment to be carried out at the beginning of the project.</p>