November 24, 2022 - The Asia Foundation successfully organized a forum entitled "Empowering Women Entrepreneurs in Gyeonggi Province" on November 22, 2022. The forum provided a venue where women entrepreneurs can share their difficulties, stories, and successful cases and discuss possible measures to enhance the women's entrepreneurship ecosystem with various stakeholders from business support organizations, think tanks, NGOs, and private entities. Fifty-six people attended, which proved the high interest of stakeholders in women entrepreneurs in Gyeonggi province.

The keynote speaker, Kim Borye, senior researcher at the Women Economic Research Institute, remarked that women-owned enterprises contribute to women's economic participation as they tend to hire women employees more. She also proposed new programs based on the regional characteristics of Gyeonggi province, education to foster women's entrepreneurship, and increasing public awareness of women's entrepreneurship as a policy agenda.

The first session, facilitated by Choi Yoonsun, a former senior researcher at the Gyeonggido Women & Family Foundation, highlighted the difficulties women entrepreneurs in Gyeonggi province have experienced. Panels of women entrepreneurs, Go Hyemi (10koco), Kim Soyun (SaveUsLab), and Yoo Jieun (Ddakddaguri) shared hardships of starting a business without enough preparation or long-term goals and persuading investors who lack the understanding of women entrepreneurs or in the related field.

In the second session, after the presentations of the Gyeonggido Job Foundation and The Asia Foundation on support programs for women entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs had the opportunity to share their success stories. Lim Hayul, the CEO of Solemaman, shared how these programs supported her journey from creating a business plan to being awarded at the 2022 Korea International Women's Invention Competition. The president of the Personal Initiative Women Entrepreneurs Association (PIWA), Yoon Jihye, also the CEO of Endless, shared the background of PIWA's establishment through support programs and cases of cooperation among the members to strengthen active business mindset and share information of business support & operation.

Shin Seon Mee, a senior researcher at the Korea Women's Development Institute, facilitated the third session. Panelists Hong Chun-hee, the head of the Gyeonggido Job Foundation's Women's Capacity Development Division; Yoo Youngseong, a senior researcher from Gyeonggi Research Institute; and Yoon Jihye, the president of PIWA, discussed their visions for supporting women entrepreneurs and their businesses. They stressed the need to enhance access to information for start-up and enterprise support programs the central and local governments provide, foster entrepreneurship that boosts innovation, and support the reconciliation of work and family life.

In the post-survey, 98 percent of the respondents were satisfied with the event. Over 80 percent reported that they better understood the difficulties and experiences of women entrepreneurs and support programs and discussed the vision to move forward. Seven media channels and organizations covered the event, including the Women's News and four blogs.