New business women’s chamber aims to empower South African entrepreneurs

In the backdrop of South Africa’s evolving economic landscape, a pioneering initiative has emerged to empower women entrepreneurs. The Global Business Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GBWCCI) was established in April 2024, catalysed by a group of passionate women who recognised a void in dedicated representation for women business leaders.

Founder Fawzia Peer met a group of women at a business summit and the idea developed to form a business women’s chamber in South Africa. 

Peer said provinces had several chambers, and there were women within the boardrooms, but they were not looking at women’s issues. 

“That prompted me, after much thought, that I should go for it. I gathered a few women, who are founder members, and we sat together and applied our minds, and we came to this final resolution that yes,” Peer said. 

Peer explained that being a chamber member enhances your business visibility, which is important and also the credibility to position you as a trusted part of the local economy. 

“Our ladies in business, the small businesses, this is not a la-di-da chamber, this is the chamber for women who are startups, they are suffering in business, so we want to create a business environment that will nurture entrepreneurship and in the same strength we want to promote sustainable development,” Peer said. 

“These are points that most chambers holistically won’t look at, particularly for women, so we are focusing on that. If the women excel, we will try and facilitate investments as well. 

“The main purpose of this chamber is to provide services to members who need our assistance. We forget women, and women are the ones who are on the ground doing the hard work.”

The chamber aims to attract businesses from all sectors, including manufacturing, wholesaling, trading, and importing. 

“Import and export will be our main focus because we are going to collaborate with the African continent. We want to make sure our ladies sell outside South Africa, in the African continent, collaborate with them and promote our members’ products and services,” Peer explained. 

“We are only servicing our people here, but we need to now send it out to African countries. They want to come here. They want to collaborate with us, so we’re going to work with African countries to trade with them.” 

Peer said the chamber is well established. 

“I’m the founder member, I started it all. We have our exco section, and that is the president, the deputy president, and three vice presidents. The three vice presidents are people of different races, like we have white, coloured, and Indian, so we have covered all the races. We want the rainbow nation there. Our deputy president is a black woman, Dr Thandi Ngxogo.” 

Peer said 300 delegates are expected at the launch at the Elangeni Hotel in Durban. 

“We are going to have good speakers, well-renowned speakers,” Peer said.  

EThekwini Municipality mayor Cyril Xaba will welcome guests. 

Among the speakers are Small Business Development Minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams, University of KwaZulu-Natal’s Dr Lindiwe ‘Malindi’ Kunene, National African Federated Chamber of Commerce and Industry chairperson Paul Ngema and Africa for Africa Women Empowerment president Bea Hackula.

thobeka.ngema@inl.co.za