In a high-stakes move to dismantle the systemic barriers facing female entrepreneurs, Sterling Bank hosted the “Funding Her Future” Breakfast Dialogue at The Wheatbaker Hotel, Ikoyi. The event, organized through the bank’s OneWoman initiative, gathered a “brain trust” of development finance institutions, tech founders, and policymakers to address a staggering reality: the $42 billion annual financing gap facing women in Africa.
Moving Beyond Intention Managing Director Abubakar Suleiman (represented by Chief Growth Officer Edward Ogunmekan) emphasized that the dialogue was designed to turn “shared belief into shared action.” The bank’s strategy for female-led growth is built on three non-negotiable pillars:
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Capital: Moving beyond simple loans to scalable, commercially sound finance.
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Capacity: Equipping women with “business readiness” to navigate complex markets.
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Community: Building the networks necessary for resilience and long-term scaling.
The “Invisible” Barrier Ezinne Nwokafor, Head of the OneWoman Initiative, presented a sobering data-driven look at the current landscape. Despite women making up a massive share of Nigeria’s MSMEs, they remain disproportionately excluded from formal credit.
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Rejection Rates: Loan application rejection rates remain significantly higher for women than for men.
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Structural Gaps: Nwokafor highlighted that the lack of asset ownership (collateral) and traditional social norms continue to act as “invisible ceilings” for female founders.
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The Data Deficit: A lack of financial data and visibility often makes women-led businesses appear “riskier” to traditional institutional lenders.
A Multi-Sectoral Solution The dialogue featured heavyweights like ‘Solape Akinpelu, CEO of HerVest, and senior executives from Sterling’s Commercial Banking division. The consensus was that access to cash is only one part of the equation. To truly unlock “Her Future,” the ecosystem must provide:
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Gender-Lens Investing: Tailoring financial products to the specific cash-flow cycles of women-led firms.
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Institutional Partnerships: Collaborating with development finance institutions to de-risk lending to female entrepreneurs.
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Digital Visibility: Using tech to build the credit history that traditional assets currently fail to provide.
The Bottom Line Sterling Bank is positioning the OneWoman initiative not just as a CSR project, but as a strategic economic lever. By addressing the $42 billion shortfall, the bank aims to tap into a massive, underutilized engine of Nigeria’s prosperity, proving that backing women isn’t just “the right thing to do”—it’s a massive commercial opportunity.
