Economic Empowerment and Training of Women for Rural Employment Generation

With this project, the ILO proposes to build on a current initiative to develop and demonstrate an integrated approach to rural employment creation and livelihood improvement in Sekong province in southern Lao PDR. The proposed project will support the overall ILO work on rural employment creation described above. It is intended to contribute specifically to productive job creation, decentralized development and the improvement of the living and working conditions of women in the rural setting. It continues with the main strategies that have been piloted by previous ILO projects, in particular the WEDGE project. The project will work mostly at the provincial level. It will also support the country in developing a national strategy for rural employment creation to achieve the goals and targets of the National Socio-economic Development Plan (NSDEP). The overall rural development strategy targets both the farm and the non-farm rural sector, and the objective is to create more and better jobs in rural areas by: a) raising agricultural productivity by providing agriculture services and improved water management; and b) creating productive non-farm job opportunities by promoting local economic development through a value chain of agro based industries, infrastructure development and skill development. This proposed project contributes to the above by strengthening the capacity of producers to sustain their livelihood and enterprises and by this increase income security, reduce poverty and achieve gender equality in one province in Lao PDR. In particular, the project will focus on the creation of an enabling environment for promoting the replication of successful strategies for rural women’s economic empowerment and gender equality, and on improving access to decent income-generation opportunities through micro-enterprise and livelihood development among low-income rural women in Sekong Province in Lao PDR.

Project symbol

LAO/11/01/AGF

Admin unit

CO-Bangkok

Start date

01/02/2014

End date

31/01/2016

Total allocation

69946

Total expenditure

Status

Closed

69946

Development Partners

Arab Gulf Programme for Development Organization

Country/Countries

Lao People's Democratic Republic

Outcomes

Decent work in the rural economy