The Nigerian Export Promotion Council (NEPC) will collaborate with MallforAfrica plans to assist over 200,000 women entrepreneurs to sell their products in the global market. This initiative will be carried out under the MFA Women Empowerment for Global Market Access Program (WE-GMAP 2020).
The WE-GMAP 2020 initiative is a platform that allows small and micro businesses to sell their products across the globe in bits, thereby promoting made-in-Nigeria products to the world.
On behalf of MallforAfrica, the Managing Director, Tope Folayan said at the launch of the platform in Lagos “We are launching an export platform. Basically, up to this point, MallforAfrica has been a platform primarily for allowing international merchants sell into Africa but now, we are flipping it by allowing local merchants sell internationally.”
“We are going to show people the ease of selling online, how to put their products online, how to sell to a global market, quality controls and what the international market is seeking. Our focus is on women because we realise that if you empower a woman, you are empowering a whole family and a community,” he added.
The platform has a quality control element to ensure that products standards are met. “There is an onboarding process where we vet the merchants before coming on board. We look out for those businesses that have a brand and quality they can stand by. Only people with good quality products are allowed on the platform,” the managing director said.
He noted that MallforAfrica has partnered with Paypal, Master Card, VISA and to address the issues of payments with international transactions, while also collaborating with DHL to address logistics weaknesses.
Programme Coordinator, MallforAfrica, Liz Oluwadare, said the goal of the initiative is to build the capacity of 200,000 women to export their products, improve their quality standards and provide them access to international markets.
