Tara Mulhare and Rebekah Daniel

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Doreen Bogdan-Martin:

Is this thing on? Can you hear me?

Technician:

Yes, we can, loud and clear. Thank you. Welcome to the latest episode of the UNconnected, a podcast series about Information and Communication Technologies and development with Doreen Bogdan-Martin, Director of the ITU Telecommunications Development Bureau.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin:

Technology can be a game changer for female entrepreneurs’ access to the Internet, and the digital skills to use ICTs presents immense economic opportunities for them to improve their livelihoods. That’s why ITU with the support of the Enhanced Integrated Framework (EIF), and the EQUALS Global Partnership, launched a project on enhancing the digital ecosystem and digital skills for the economic empowerment of women in LDCs. Today, I'm happy to have with me two very inspiring women. We have Tara Mulhare, and we have Rebecca Daniel. Tara is a leader in the textiles and apparel sector, and she provides coaching and mentorship for emerging businesses. She is the sector lead of the textiles and apparel capacity building programme of ITU and EIF's project, and she brings more than 20 years of experience in the fashion industry in areas such as marketing, sales, e-commerce, and retail startups. Rebecca is a young woman entrepreneur joining us from Addis Ababa, and she's currently in the process of establishing her startup in the leather goods sector in Ethiopia. Rebecca is currently enrolled in ITU and EIF’s programme. Thank you both so much for taking the time to chat with us today. Tara, we're going to start with you, given your two decades worth of experience in textiles and the apparel sector. Can you tell us about the main barriers and the challenges for women entrepreneurs in the sector that also want to succeed in the digital sphere? And how does the programme address these barriers in Ethiopia specifically? Over to you, Tara.

Tara Mulhare:

Yes, I have been working in the industry for over 20 years. And I've been very blessed to have worked with the top international retailers. I've had my own startups internationally in several different countries. And I've worked with over 1000 businesses in over 90 countries. Why am I telling you all that? It's because what I've seen to be the main barrier to entry, particularly for women entrepreneurs, is access. Access to everything in the industry, especially right now with the fact that there is no difference between succeeding outside the digital sphere and in the digital sphere. You have to be digital. Particularly over the last 18 months, with everything that has happened in the world. Businesses need to go digital, but the biggest problem that there is, is the access to the information, access to utilising the different digital tools, access to internet. Our main focus in this programme is to provide up-to-the-minute information from the industry experts themselves, really giving information to the businesses in Ethiopia, particularly female entrepreneurs, so that they are aware of what they need to do, how to navigate through this constant changing, evolving digital sphere that is happening in the industry, and making sure that they're very competitive. In addition, as a female entrepreneur I have myself worked with countless entrepreneurs as well.  As a female entrepreneur, you are often mostly isolated. You'll probably hear Rebecca even discuss, how you really feel like you don't have a community around you, you really feel that you're alone in this journey. In addition to our focus on really bringing together the different experts and giving the information, we're really going to be focusing on building a community and infrastructure for the entrepreneurs in Ethiopia, where a lot of our activities will be going outside the major cities, making sure that people have a support system to access technology, that they can communicate with each other, collaborate and where they grow as an entrepreneur.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin:

Terrific. Thank you so much. That importance of building a community, and as you said, access being the main barrier, you have to be digital… As Tara explained, this capacity building programme aims to increase women's economic and professional opportunities by equipping them with these essential digital skills. So, Rebecca, can you tell us about your experience? What inspired you to apply? And how do you think the programme can help women overcome some of these challenges? Rebecca, over to you.

Rebekah Daniel:

Thank you, Doreen, and thank you for including me in this podcast, I really appreciate it. So I live in Ethiopia. And I'm in the process of launching my own leather brand called ‘HELMI’. And I'm focusing on designing leather handbags especially for women. And when I saw the advert for this programme, what inspired me to apply was just the fact that this programme would help us gain more access to different digital skills and digital tools. Marketplaces that I had not known about before. So far, I've attended two webinars with Tara. I've been really happy, I've learned a lot of new information just from the webinars about understanding how to market my business digitally, how to understand what the export standards and the industry standards specifically in fashion are at the moment, and try to understand how to scale my business and to launch my business here in Ethiopia, and also internationally. I think the programme can give us women, especially in Ethiopia, where we are slightly behind in use of technology – and we have a lot of barriers, especially related to funding and finance, but also perhaps our fashion industry is not as internationally available – so I think in those terms, to be able to have access to work, to work with somebody like Tara, who's worked with so many different international brands, is definitely a huge benefit for us. For people working in fashion in Ethiopia, just getting that information from the industry experts and on the standards, access to these different marketplaces and digital marketing methods and marketplaces themselves is a huge benefit.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin:

That's great. Thank you. Thank you, Rebecca. We look forward to seeing those leather handbags. So far, we've talked about challenges. But Tara, what are some of the successes of women entrepreneurs using digital tools in this field? And what can we learn from them?

Tara Mulhare:

What I love overall about working with women entrepreneurs, is when they have success, everyone around them has success. What I've really found to be the exciting part about this, is that as you work and you train, and you really expose and give access to these tools to female entrepreneurs, and they gain success, they not only train their employees, but they also ensure that their supply chains, their whole communities, are given these tools as well. And that's been really the exciting part of programmes. This programme is really making sure that it's not just the female entrepreneur, but it's also her community. And these skills are really growing and building a digital infrastructure in each country. It was funny that this morning, I actually had a call with one of the businesses that I was working with and it was really, really an exciting story because she was so resistant to technology. She was really working to build an omnichannel strategy, and what that means is one message across all of her different sales channels. She really worked on building her Instagram, and you know, making sure that she was using the right tools on Instagram. Due to COVID, because of the different restrictions in countries, the buyer that was coming to do a meeting had to cancel and then she couldn't travel there. The buyer, the Japanese buyer, went on to her Instagram, where they looked, did a deep dive into her Instagram, saw her different supply chain, saw the transparency that she was giving, saw the quality of her products. Really basically from Instagram, placed an order and told her your company matches everything that I'm looking for – and you did such a great job of showing me what your company was through Instagram. And now her supply chain of 3000 people, or women mostly, has another order that can really support them during COVID times and that is what access is— giving that type of access to the right information. What types of information you need to use, what channels you should be using for your business, has such a successful impact in each of the communities that we're working with.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin:

Rebecca, you're an entrepreneur yourself, from your personal experience, what would you say to young women who want to learn more about digital tools to start or to expand their business?

Rebekah Daniel:

Yeah, I would definitely say go online research, research, research. Look at other brands, especially if it's in fashion, look at what's going on elsewhere, what's going on elsewhere in Africa, research your target audience. Especially from the webinars, what I've learned is definitely define your audience. Define your marketplace and research, follow different trends, follow these websites— what I've been using, that Tara has mentioned, is women's wear daily. Look at digital sourcing, digital marketplaces and just different ways of conceptualizing the target audience and customers, and using those different marketplaces to reach possible buyers. That is what I would say to any woman trying to get access to the fashion industry.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin:

Thank you, Rebecca, for sharing such an inspiring story. So now if I can ask a question to both of you –

what can governments, the private sector and other stakeholders do to improve the access and the use of digital technologies by women entrepreneurs? Shall we start with you first, Tara, over to you.

Tara Mulhare:

Yes, it's the continuation of providing information. Because digital technologies are moving so quickly. It's really making sure that they're providing up-to-date information. I see a lot of programmes. They're really good at giving information. And then because technology is moving, the next year, it's not relevant. So really making sure that the programmes are current, and that entrepreneurs are aware of all the opportunities that are available in the international and national market as well.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin:

Rebecca?

Rebekah Daniel:

Yes, definitely, I would say access to different kinds of information, but also with governments in the private sector, also access to funding, because a lot of these different technologies and access to them, a lot of these marketplaces I mean, require a lot of funding, which is something that I want to point out— the ease of access to funding so that we can have access to different technologies and different digital marketplaces, that actually require or have different fees or technologies like digital sketching and actual tools, as all of those also require funding. So that's my addition to what Tara had said.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin:

Super, thank you. Thank you both for that. And of course, that access to digital technologies, access to funding as you've just stressed, and of course, the importance of really building that needed awareness. And so if I can, I'd like to put one last question to both of you. And I'm putting this same question to all of my interviewees. What was the first mobile device that you had and how did it change your life? Rebecca, you first, over to you.

Rebekah Daniel:

Sure, I think my first mobile device was a Nokia 3210. They are those old mobile phones. I think I must have been probably like, 12 years old when I got it. So it definitely changed my life, I became definitely much cooler in school, back in the day, but also, I think just being able to connect with people and friends on the go, was a huge change in my life. And I think this was more than 20 years ago.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin:

That's great. Thank you. And Tara, how about you?

Tara Mulhare:

Well, I have to say, Rebecca, this is where I'm showing my age. I'm glad to hear that you said you had a Nokia, I did as well. And I just remember you couldn't even properly send texts now if you think about it, and it's  to see how much we've advanced and how many years, but it also opened such opportunities to really like you said, stay connected with family and friends. And like you said on the go— it wasn't restricted anymore. You could take a phone call anywhere and message anyone. So it really opened many doors for me.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin:

Terrific. Well, thank you. Thank you so much, Tara, and Rebecca, for joining us today for this podcast. And thanks so much for sharing your fascinating and inspirational stories and insights. So this concludes this episode of the UNconnected podcast. Until next time, let's all stay connected. Goodbye.

Technician:

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