{
  "id": 6542736,
  "title": "Prioritise rural businesses in Women’s Bank – NETRIGHT urges gov’t",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/10/prioritise-rural-businesses-in-womens-bank-netright-urges-govt",
  "topic": "world",
  "section": "World",
  "published": "2026-09-10T04:56:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "MyJoyOnline Ghana",
    "slug": "myjoyonline-ghana",
    "url": "https://www.myjoyonline.com/prioritise-rural-businesses-in-womens-bank-netright-urges-govt/"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "The Network for Women's Rights in Ghana (NETRIGHT) has urged the government to prioritize rural businesses, especially women-owned and operated enterprises, in the Women's Development Bank (WDB). Mrs. Patricia Blankson Akakpo, the Head of NETRIGHT Secretariat, made this call during a forum discussing inclusive and gender-responsive budget priorities. Despite receiving a combined GH¢452.3 million budget allocation for 2025 and 2026, the WDB remains underoperational, leading to concerns over delayed access to funds for rural women and businesses.\n\nNetright has raised questions about the bank's mandate, structure, beneficiary selection, and its ability to address systemic challenges such as high interest rates, collateral requirements, and documentation barriers that have historically excluded rural women from traditional banking. Mrs. Akakpo called for the incorporation of recommendations from the 2027 budget to ensure effective implementation and women's benefits from the WDB.\n\nThe organization also advocated for leveraging existing women-friendly financial systems like village savings and loans associations, emphasizing transparency and the use of disaggregated data in fund disbursement. In addition to the WDB, Netright called for a minimum 40-50% allocation of agricultural programs to women, in line with the Affirmative Action Act, and the linkage of state programs such as the School Feeding Programme and National Food Buffer Stock Company (NAFCO) to women producer cooperatives to improve market accessibility.",
  "summary": "The Network for Women’s Rights in Ghana (NETRIGHT) has urged the Government to make the Women’s Development Bank (WDB)work for rural businesses, especially those owned by women, youth and the marginalised, while encouraging acceleration of its operationalisation.",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}