and herself a successful entrepreneur.
In her role, she focuses on the education
and economic empowerment of women and their families.
Prior to this, she oversaw development and acquisitions
at the Trump Organization, and together with her brothers,
Ivanka founded Trump Hotels in Siam.
She is an entrepreneur, but most important for us,
she's been the driving force behind the women's
entrepreneurship financing initiative,
and why we're here today, Ivanka.
Thank you.
Oh, there she is.
Oh, this is funny.
Next, her Excellency, Rihvind Ibrahim El-Hashimi,
is the recently appointed Minister of State
for International Cooperation for the United Arab Emirates.
She joined the federal government in 2008 as Minister of State
and has worked on the UAE's bid to host the World Expo 2020 in Dubai.
Thank you.
Stephen Pui is CEO of Banco BHD Leon
in the Dominican Republic.
He also serves as President of AFI BHD
and is a board member of BHD International Bank of Panama.
Prior to joining Banco BHD Leon,
Stephen was Vice President from the private sector
at the Inter-American Development Bank.
Wow.
All right.
Thanks, everybody.
So just a very straightforward question.
Why do you think, and this is for everybody,
why do you think it's important to take women entrepreneurs
to the next level?
You know, we've done so much through conditional cash transfers,
through micro enterprise lending,
and a lot of informal businesses have been set up.
But our focus is really to take women to the next level,
the levels that we've seen with the entrepreneurs.
Ivanka, what's your vision for this initiative
and why is it so important to take them to the next level?
Well, first of all, thank you, President Kim.
Thank you for having us here,
and thank you to these amazing entrepreneurs
and all the stories we've heard
who so well articulate why it's so important.
It's more than important, it's critical
as we think about sustained, inclusive,
global economic growth.
So fully unleashing the power of women in our economy
will create tremendous value
but also bring much needed peace,
stability, and prosperity to so many regions.
So it is interesting when you ask why,
and for all the talk about women's economic empowerment,
one of the questions I had when we first met back in April
is what was being done outside of microfinance
because there's been a tremendous amount of great work
that's been happening in the microfinance space
to help male and female entrepreneurs get their start.
But beyond that, and to enable small businesses,
even very small businesses, to scale
and to realize their full potential,
oftentimes there was no liquidity,
especially in the developing world,
where the credit gap is estimated for women
at over $300 billion annually.
So access to capital was an enormous challenge.
So we started talking about how we could change that
and how we could create something truly revolutionary
that would think about small and middle-sized
female entrepreneurs in the developing world,
truly empower them.
And when you empower women, as we've heard from the presentations,
women invest in other women and employ other women
and create a tremendous ecosystem of opportunity
within their communities.
They say that women invest $0.90 on the dollar
back into their family, their family's education,
their family's health, and their community at large.
So investing in women is great business.
We've seen this time and time again.
And we're looking to really eliminate barriers
to access to capital, to access to mentors
and to access to networks.
And through WeFi, the Women's Entrepreneur Finance Initiative,
which was announced at the G20
with 12 other founding country partners,
we're excited to take a major step in doing just that.
And now we're up to 15, I think,
15 different founding members.
$350 million that was raised in about five months,
which is very fast, even for us.
Your Excellency, why is it important to take...
Hi.
Hi.
Hi.
I'm the world's best bank credit.
I am, yes.
Oh, look.
This is great.
Did you get that?
From April of 2017, when Yabaka first came just to talk about this,
we are now off and running.
So the first tranche will be $150 million.
And it's open to anyone.
It's a regular World Bank fund.
The governance of it will be our usual World Bank governance,
but also 15 donor countries will all be part of a group
that decides on which projects will go forward.
So we are open for business.
The mentorship network will get up and going very quickly.
Ivanka will be part of it.
And our three entrepreneurs that you heard from today will be part of it.
Please make your applications
and support this as much as you possibly can.
Can we have first the three entrepreneurs stand up?
Thank you for being here.
And I want to thank Ivanka, your excellency, and Stephen.
Thank you for being here.
Great discussion, very substantial.
And we'll make this happen.
It's the first in history, $350 million in grants
that will be leveraged into well over a billion dollars
in support for women entrepreneurs, both public and private.
And let me also say that we're still open for more donations
because I think the need is tremendous
and we'll keep growing this in order to meet that deficit
that Ivanka talked about.
Thanks very much for coming, everybody.
Okay, I want to get out.
Domestically, we're very focused on ensuring our next generation
of American student is equipped with the skills
to succeed in a modern economy.
And that includes a strong computer science foundation.
Just two weeks ago, the president signed a presidential memorandum
directing the Department of Education to prioritize this
because technology is foundational to every industry,
including banking, including finance, obviously,
including entrepreneurship.
So you look at certain areas of the world
where it's actually dangerous to carry cash.
So what do you do with your small business owners?
Well, the use of mobile phones allows you to be able to accept payments
from a customer without actually having cash
and risking and having the danger of having large cash on hand.
So this is just one of the many, many ways technology
is impacting the ability of people to create business
and create opportunity.
And I think all of our countries and all of our nations
have to be very focused on ensuring that our populations
have strong education and foundation in STEM
to help them really leverage that for the future.
And I'm excited to see the work that we find we'll be doing on this.
And I will just point out, because I see him right here,
Eli Miller, chief of staff to Secretary Mnuchin,
is here and has been a tremendous champion
on behalf of the United States government for this effort.
So we're very appreciative to have you here.
And today is very special because just this week,
WeFi actually became operational
and put out its first request for proposals from entrepreneurs.
So thank you, Eli.
I think technology would be a massive transformation
of the fact that only 10% of women
say that they had the access to the capital they needed
to start their businesses.
So it's incredibly small, yet just within entrepreneurship,
if you could close the gender gap in entrepreneurship,
that would lead by a recent estimation
that was published in the last couple of months,
they say that that would lead to 2% GDP growth globally.
So think about that, closing that gender entrepreneurship gap
and the impact of 2% global GDP growth.
So it's an enormous opportunity,
and this credit gap is something
that hopefully WeFi starts to help address.
And I think there's also challenges,
which depending on where you go,
but particularly in the developing world,
there are no financial institutions.
So if you look at sub-Saharan Africa,
70% of the adult population
has no financial institutions
from which to banquet,
which is very eliminating towards growth.
So focusing on these areas,
making sure that there's financial inclusion,
this does disproportionately affect women
who have even less access
than their male counterparts,
but it's a problem for them as well
in many areas of the developing world.
I wanted to add that I think that while all of us...
and in traveling around the world,
whether it's in communities in the United States
or to far-flung destinations,
I hear it time and time again,
that mentorship arguably is more valued
and more important than even access to capital.
So women oftentimes say,
great game, early stage capital
for friends and families
and have much less access,
but that mentorship is equally valuable to them
as I think about scaling.
So when we first started talking about WeCloud,
we asked ourselves,
well, what are the critical components to success
and where are the unique barriers?
So the access to capital barriers,
the access to network,
and in part because there are less mentors
and less women in the entrepreneurship ecosystem,
there are less trading partners
and natural trading partners.
Women are less inclined to do business
or cross borders for cultural reasons,
sometimes for legal reasons.
So how do we create network opportunities for women?
How do we think about the legal restrictions
in many countries around the world?
There are very strong prohibitions
to female entrepreneurship
around land inheritance,
requiring permission to travel
that need to be considered
in the context of We.Fly's work
as we think about where,
and as the World Bank Group thinks about,
where they're going to lend that capital
and how they can change the legal framework for success.
But I do think this mentorship part is critical.
And one of the things that we're able to uniquely
think about, consider, and do,
and I'm so glad that you have such a passion for,
is really leveraging the benefits of technology
to create a marketplace for peer-to-peer advice.
So I, on a personal level,
am going to spend a lot of time
doing any value that I can as a mentor to people
and also a mentee,
because I'm sure I'll learn a lot in return.
But I think in addition to getting people
of higher profile on the platform,
I think creating an opportunity for people
in similar businesses at similar stages
to be able to talk to their peers around the globe
through a digital interface
is a very, very exciting opportunity
and something that I can't wait to see you build out
and look forward to being an active participant.
Well, what Ivanka mentioned is really important.
This was among the discussions we had.
This is the first platform that's going to provide
financing and mentorship directly to women
who are working in the private sector.
But we also have a public sector wing.
In other words, all the limitations and restrictions,
laws that are in place that Ivanka just mentioned,
we have to get at those as well.
There's going to be a big chunk of Wi-Fi
that focuses on governments to change their laws
so that it's easier for women to do all the things
that Ivanka talked about.
Your Excellency, I've been to Dubai
and I've seen that there's a successful entrepreneur.
In her role, she focuses on the education
and economic empowerment of women and their families.
Prior to this, she oversaw development
and acquisitions at the Trump Organization.
And together with her brothers,
Ivanka founded Trump Hotels in Siam.
She's an entrepreneur, but most important for us,
she's been the driving force behind women's
entrepreneurship financing initiative
and why we're here today.
Ivanka, thank you.
Thank you.
Oh, there she is.
This is funny.
Next, her Excellency, Reem Bin Ibrahim
and Hashemi is the recently appointed
Minister of State for International Cooperation
for the United Arab Emirates.
She joined the federal government in 2008
as Minister of State and has worked on the OAs
bid to host the World Expo 2020 in Dubai.
Your Excellency, thank you.
Stephen Pui is CEO of Banco BHD Leon
in the Dominican Republic.
He also serves as President of BFI BHD
and is a board member of BHD International Bank of Panama.
Prior to joining Banco BHD Leon,
Stephen was Vice President from the private sector
at the Inter-American Development Bank.
All right. Thanks everybody.
So just a very straightforward question.
Why do you think, and this is for everybody,
why do you think it's important to take women entrepreneurs
to the next level?
You know, we've done so much through
conditional cash transfers, through micro-enterprise lending
and a lot of informal businesses have been set up
but our focus is really to take women to the next level,
to levels that we've seen with the entrepreneurs.
Ivanka, what's your vision for this initiative
and why is it so important to take them to the next level?
Well, first of all, thank you, President Kim.
Thank you for having us here.
And thank you to these amazing entrepreneurs
whose stories we heard, who so well articulate
why it's so important.
It's more than important, it's critical
as we think about sustained, inclusive, global,
economic growth.
So fully unleashing the power of women in our economy
will create tremendous value
and also bring much needed peace, stability,
and prosperity to so many regions.
So it is interesting when you ask why
and for all the talk about women's economic empowerment,
one of the questions I had when we first met back in April
is what was being done outside of microfinance
because there's been a tremendous amount of great work
that's been happening in the microfinance space
to help male and female entrepreneurs get their start.
But beyond that, and to enable small businesses,
even very small businesses, to scale
and to realize their full potential,
oftentimes there was no liquidity,
especially in the developing world,
where the credit gap is estimated for women
at over $300 billion annually.
So access to capital was an enormous challenge.
So we started talking about how we could change that
and how we could create something truly revolutionary
that would think about small and middle-sized
female entrepreneurs in the developing world,
truly empower them.
And when you empower women, as we've heard from the presentations,
women invest in other women and employ other women
and create a tremendous ecosystem of opportunity
within their communities.
They say that women invest $0.90 on the dollar
back into their family, their family's education,
their family's health, and their community at large.
So investing in women is great business.
We've seen this time and time again,
and we're looking to really eliminate barriers
to access to capital, to access to mentors,
and to access to networks.
And through WeFi, the Women's Entrepreneurial Finance Initiative,
which was announced at the G20
with 12 other founding country partners,
we're excited to take a major step in doing just that.
And now we're up to 15, I think,
15 different founding members.
$350 million that was raised in about five months,
which is very fast, even for us.
Your Excellency, why is it important to take
at yourself a successful entrepreneur?
In her role, she focuses on the education
and economic empowerment of women and their families.
Prior to this, she oversaw development
and acquisitions at the Trump Organization.
And together with her brothers,
Ivanka founded Trump Hotels in Siam.
She's an entrepreneur, but most important for us,
she's been the driving force behind
Women's Entrepreneurship Finance Initiative,
and that's why we're here today.
Ivanka, thank you.
Oh, there she is.
Oh, this is funny.
Next, her Excellency Reem Bint Ibrahim El-Hashimi
is the recently appointed Minister of State
for International Cooperation for the United Arab Emirates.
She joined the federal government in 2008
as Minister of State and has worked on the UAE's bid
to host the World Expo 2020 in Dubai.
Thank you, Excellency.
Stephen Pui is CEO of Banco BHD Leon
in the Dominican Republic.
He also serves as President of AFI BHD
and is a board member of BHD International Bank of Panama.
Prior to joining Banco BHD Leon,
Stephen was Vice President for the private sector
at the Inter-American Development Bank.
Wow.
All right. Thanks, everybody.
So just a very straightforward question.
Why do you think, and this is for everybody,
why do you think it's important
to take women entrepreneurs to the next level?
You know, we've done so much
through the conditional cash transfers,
through micro-enterprise lending,
and a lot of informal businesses have been set up,
but our focus is really to take women to the next level,
to levels that we've seen with the entrepreneurs.
Ivanka, what's your vision for this initiative
and why is it so important to take them to the next level?
Well, first of all, thank you, President Kim.
Thank you for having us here,
and thank you to these amazing entrepreneurs
whose stories we heard
do so well articulate why it's so important.
It's more than important, it's critical
as we think about sustained, inclusive,
global economic growth.
So fully unleashing the power of women in our economy
will create tremendous value,
but also bring much needed peace,
stability, and prosperity to so many regions.
So it is interesting when you ask why,
and for all the talk about women's economic empowerment,
one of the questions I had when we first met back in April
is what was being done outside of microfinance,
because there's been a tremendous amount of great work
that's been happening in the microfinance space
to help male and female entrepreneurs get their start.
But beyond that, and to enable small businesses,
even very small businesses, to scale
and to realize their full potential,
oftentimes there was no liquidity,
especially in the developing world,
where the credit gap is estimated for women
at over $300 billion annually.
So access to capital was an enormous challenge.
So we started talking about how we could change that
and how we could create something truly revolutionary
that would think about small and middle-sized
female entrepreneurs in the developing world
truly empower them.
And when you empower women, as we've heard from the presentations,
women invest in other women and employ other women
and create a tremendous ecosystem of opportunity
within their communities.
They say that women invest $0.90 on the dollar
back into their family, their family's education,
their family's health, and their community at large.
So investing in women is great business.
We've seen this time and time again,
and we're looking to really eliminate barriers
to access to capital, to access to mentors,
and to access to networks.
And through WeFi, the Women's Entrepreneurial Finance Initiative,
which was announced at the G20
with 12 other founding country partners,
we're excited to take a major step in doing just that.
And now we're up to 15 different founding members.
$350 million that was raised in about five months,
which is very fast, even for us.
Your Excellency, why is it important to take...
Hi.
Hi.
Hello.
Hi.
Thanks for world-telling credit.
I am, yes.
Oh, look.
This is great.
Did you get that?
And in traveling around the world,
whether it's in communities in the United States,
or to far-flung destinations,
I hear it time and time again,
that mentorship, arguably,
is more valued and more important
than even access to capital.
So women oftentimes, say,
gain early-stage capital through friends and families
and have much less access.
But that mentorship is equally valuable to them
as they think about scaling.
So when we first started talking about WeFi,
we asked ourselves,
well, what are the critical components to success
and where are the unique barriers?
So the access to capital barriers,
the access to network,
and in part because there are less mentors,
there are less women in the entrepreneurship ecosystem,
there are less trading partners and natural trading partners.
Women are less inclined to do business
or cross borders for cultural reasons,
sometimes for legal reasons.
So how do we create network opportunities for women?
How do we think about the legal restrictions
in many countries around the world?
There are very strong prohibitions
to female entrepreneurship around land inheritance,
requiring permission to travel
that need to be considered in the context of WeFi's work,
as we think about where,
and as the World Bank Group thinks about
where they're going to lend that capital
and how they can change the legal framework for success.
But I do think this mentorship part is critical.
And one of the things that we're able to uniquely
think about, consider and do,
and I'm so glad that you have such a passion for,
is really leveraging the benefits of technology
to create a marketplace for peer-to-peer advice.
So I am a personal level
and I'm going to spend a lot of time
offering any value that I can as a mentor to people
and also a mentee,
because I'm sure I'll learn a lot in return.
But I think in addition to getting people
of higher profile on the platform,
I think creating an opportunity for people
in similar businesses at similar stages
to be able to talk to their peers around the globe
through a digital interface
is a very, very exciting opportunity
and something that I can't wait to see you build out
and look forward to be an active participant.
Well, what Ivanka mentioned is really important.
This was among the discussions we had.
This is the first platform that's going to provide
financing and mentorship directly to women
who are working in the private sector.
But we also have a public sector wing.
In other words, all the limitations and restrictions,
laws that are in place that Ivanka just mentioned,
we have to get at those as well.
So there will be a big chunk of WIFI
that focuses on governments to change their laws
so that it's easier for women to do all the things
that Ivanka talked about.
Now, your excellency, I've been to Dubai
and I've seen that there's a reason.
It's amazing when you think about the fact that
only 10% of women say that they had the access
to the capital they needed to start their businesses.
So it's incredibly small.
Yet just within entrepreneurship,
if you could close the gender gap in entrepreneurship,
that would lead by a recent estimation
that was published in the last couple of months.
They say that that would lead to 2% GDP growth globally.
So think about that, closing that gender entrepreneurship gap
and the impact of 2% global GDP growth.
So it's an enormous opportunity
and this credit gap is something that hopefully
WIFI starts to help address.
You know, I think there's also challenges
which, depending on where you go,
but particularly in the developing world,
there are no financial institutions.
So if you look at Sub-Saharan Africa,
70% of the adult population has no financial institutions
from which to bank with,
which is very limiting towards growth.
So focusing on these areas,
making sure that there's financial inclusion,
it does disproportionately affect women
who have even less access than their male counterparts,
but it's a problem for men as well
in many areas of the developing world.
I wanted to add that I think that while all of us...
Domestically, we're very focused on ensuring
our next generation of American students
is equipped with the skills to succeed in the modern economy
and that includes a strong computer science foundation.
This two weeks ago, the president signed a presidential memorandum
directing the Department of Education to prioritize this
because technology is foundational to every industry,
including banking, including finance,
obviously including entrepreneurship.
So you look at certain areas of the world
where it's actually dangerous to carry cash.
So what do you do if you're a small business owner as well?
The use of mobile phones allows you to be able to accept payments
from a customer without actually having cash
and risking and having the danger of having large cash on hand.
So this is just one of the many, many ways technology
is impacting the ability of people to create business
and create opportunity.
And I think all of our countries and all of our nations
have to be very focused on ensuring that our populations
have strong education and foundation in STEM
to help them really leverage that for the future
and I'm excited to see the work that we will be doing on this.
And I will just point out, because I see him right here,
Eli Miller, chief of staff to Secretary Mnuchin,
is here and has been a tremendous champion
on behalf of the United States government for this effort.
So we're very appreciative to have you here
and today is very special because just this week,
WeFi actually became operational
and put out its first request for proposals from entrepreneurs.
So thank you, Eli.
I think technology would be a massive transformation of fact.
From April of 2017, when Iwaka first came just to talk about this,
we are now off and running.
So the first tranche will be $150 million.
And it's open to anyone.
It's a regular World Bank fund.
The governance of it will be our usual World Bank governance,
but also the $15 countries will all be part of a group
that decides on which projects will go forward.
So we are open for business.
The mentorship network will get up and going very quickly.
Ivanka will be part of it.
And our three entrepreneurs that you heard from today
will be part of it.
Please make your applications and support this as much as you can.
Can we have first the three entrepreneurs stand up?
Thank you for being here.
And I want to thank Ivanka, your excellency, Stephen.
Thank you for being here.
Great discussion, very substantial.
And we'll make this happen.
It's the first in history, $350 million in grants
that will be leveraged into well over a billion dollars
in support for women entrepreneurs, both public and private.
And let me also say that we're still open for more donations
because I think the need is tremendous.
And we'll keep growing this in order to meet that deficit
that Ivanka talked about.
Thanks very much for coming, everybody.
This is great.
Did you get that?
