Jambi, 8 March 2023 - Commemorating International Women's Day, Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) Sinar Mas partners with Pijar Foundation - EdHeroes Indonesia in initiating the "Leadership & Womenpreneur Camp" to optimize opportunities for young women entrepreneurs in the Riau and Jambi regions. The Women's Leadership and Entrepreneurship camp activities were held at the PT Wirakarya Sakti (WKS) Training and Community Development Center, Sungai Tapah, Kampung Baru Hamlet, Kuala Dasal Village, West Tanjung Jabung Regency, Jambi Province on 8 – 9 March 2023.
The leadership and entrepreneurship training activities encourage women empowerment in the MSME sector through practical classes that empower aspects of leadership, entrepreneurship, technological skills, and financial literacy as well as business models and local initiatives to create leaders from cadres of young people, especially the younger generation who can become local heroes.
The Minister of Trade Zulkifli Hasan in his remarks fully supports the optimization of local superior products to target the national market through various product exhibitions that can be attended by superior products curated by training. "In 2020, the government will start the Gerakan Nasional Bangga Buatan Indonesia (Proudly Made in Indonesia National Movement) and it is projected that in 2023, it will create 36 million digital MSMEs," said Zulkifli in a recording of the event’s opening remarks.
Expert Staff for the PMK Coordinating Minister, Field of Utilization of Economic Resources, Femmy Eka Kartika Putri said that support for the real impact has occurred at the grassroots. Women have a strategic role as drivers of the family economy, and the women's MSME sector has the potential to drive the economy, especially during the pandemic, supported by digital transformation. According to data from the Coordinating Ministry for PMK, 37 million MSMEs are managed by women. The MSME sector contributes to the Gross Domestic Product of IDR 8,573 trillion in 2021.
In a separate place, APP Sinar Mas Chief Sustainability Officer Elim Sritaba in his online remarks said that APP Sinar Mas has a vision of sustainability, namely the Sustainability Roadmap Vision 2030 (SRV 2030), which has a target to improve the quality of Human Resources, including empowering women & youth in around the operational area of APP Sinar Mas and its suppliers.
"We hope that this 2-day training camp will open access to network expansion for the community around our operations through various collaboration forums with MSMEs and youth which will spark the enthusiasm of business people and youth to continue to develop their regions," said Elim.
Meanwhile, the Pijar Foundation also emphasizes the importance of women in today's era, who must be able to have access and education to develop self-capacity in the field of entrepreneurship.
"Most MSMEs in Indonesia are run by women and the success rate is quite high. We want to help open access for women throughout Indonesia to have the courage to start a business. It doesn't matter what the background of the woman is, whether it's a housewife or other profession," said Farhannisa Nasution, Chairwoman of Edheroes Asia representing the Pijar Foundation.
This women's leadership and entrepreneurship training camp is a form of collaboration between various parties from the public and private sectors such as Yanty Warko, from the Indonesian Women Entrepreneurs Association (IWAPI) as a coach for women's MSME product development, a team from Eureka Edutech who gave the materials related to digital education, a team from Indonesia Next Leader as the initiator of regional leadership initiatives, ASN Women League as an initiative to empower women in the public sector which was launched by Serevinna Dewita Simanjuntak as one of the female state civil servants, as well as the Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) which provided materials related to financial literacy.
