By Cross Udo, Abuja
The Federal Government has unveiled four strategic platforms to expand women’s access to finance, markets, and economic opportunities, with Vice President Kashim Shettima warning that Nigeria’s ambition to build a $1 trillion economy cannot be achieved without the full participation of women.
Shettima gave the warning on Wednesday at the Second National Gender Inclusion Conference, #SheIsIncluded 2026, held at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, where he said persistent gender disparities in financial inclusion were depriving the economy of significant productive capacity.
Represented by Dr Aliyu Modibbo, the Vice President said only 47 per cent of Nigerian women had formal financial accounts, compared with 58 per cent of men, leaving millions without adequate access to capital and other opportunities needed to expand their businesses.
“We have set our sights on a one-trillion-dollar economy. But what kind of economy can we build if half of our people cannot participate fully in creating it?” Shettima asked.
He said the administration was moving beyond policy declarations towards an “architecture of delivery” designed to connect women and young people with skills, capital, markets and emerging economic opportunities.
The conference, themed “Designing for Delivery: From Financial Inclusion to Economic Transformation for the Nigerian Woman,” was organised by the Presidential Committee on Economic Inclusion in the Office of the Vice President.
The Technical Adviser to the President on Economic and Financial Inclusion, Dr Nurudeen Abubakar Zauro, outlined the four platforms as digital trust infrastructure, data for accountability, blended finance and the National Income Activation Initiative.
Zauro said the objective was to move women beyond merely having bank accounts to gaining access to affordable credit, productive finance and markets capable of turning businesses into sustainable sources of income.
“Access is the beginning of inclusion; it is not its destination,” he said.
He said gender-disaggregated identity and payment data would be strengthened to make women in the informal economy more visible to financial institutions, while blended finance would combine public and concessional funds with private capital to expand financing for women-led enterprises.
Zauro said the National Income Activation Initiative would combine skills development, market access, digital tools, finance and business support across the six geopolitical zones, warning that skills without market opportunities would not translate into livelihoods.
The Deputy Chief of Staff to the President, Ibrahim Hadeija, said the initiative must evolve beyond an annual campaign into a sustained national framework for women’s economic advancement.
“A nation aspiring to a one-trillion-dollar economy cannot afford to leave the productive capacity of half its population idle,” Hadeija said.
The Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development, Imaan Sulaiman-Ibrahim, identified poor last-mile delivery, unsuitable lending models, inadequate gender-disaggregated data, insecurity and unpaid care work as major obstacles to women’s economic participation.
She disclosed that the Nigeria for Women Programme Scale-Up had reached 4.5 million women organised into 300,000 groups, while its first phase mobilised more than 560,000 women into over 26,000 groups that saved N4.9 billion and accessed about N15.6 billion in livelihood grants.
Sulaiman-Ibrahim urged banks and fintech companies to develop alternative credit-scoring systems and financing products based on women’s existing savings and repayment records.
“A crèche at a market is not a welfare gesture; it is a productivity intervention,” she said, calling for care infrastructure to be recognised as an economic investment.
Shettima challenged governments and financial institutions to measure gender inclusion by tangible economic outcomes, including expanded businesses, job creation, and improved household resilience, rather than by participation figures alone.
“Changed lives, not attendance registers, must measure inclusion,” he said.
He also called for every commitment arising from the conference to have a clearly identified owner, a measurable target, and a deadline, saying that successful interventions should be tracked, reviewed, and scaled.
The conference is the second #SheIsIncluded gathering, following the inaugural event in January 2025. The Federal Government said the initiative remains part of its broader economic and financial inclusion agenda and its ambition of building a $1 trillion economy that benefits all Nigerians.
