Women hold the key to recovery, says Natwest boss ALISON ROSE

For the first time in nearly a year, hope is on the horizon thanks to the rollout of the coronavirus vaccines. 

This extraordinary scientific and logistical effort has allowed some light to shine at the end of a long and dark tunnel.

But we cannot afford to ignore the economic and social crisis that the pandemic will leave in its wake. History tells us storms pass, societies regroup, and countries rebuild.

As we contemplate that challenge, I want to draw particular attention to the difficulties facing female entrepreneurs as well as highlighting the benefits to the whole economy if they are able to fulfil their potential.

Natwest is launching a second £1billion tranche of funding to extend our support to female entrepreneurs and business owners.

This is the biggest ever commitment by a lender in support of female entrepreneurs, and it follows an earlier £1billion of funds.

We have also established a small and medium enterprise taskforce, to look at what more barriers we can remove, along with 600 Women In Business specialists.

Female business owners have access to our Accelerator hubs, with a target to ensure that 60 per cent of those supported are women.

Evidence from the last ten months makes clear that women have suffered a disproportionate economic hit in the pandemic.

But the truth is that conditions were far from perfect, and opportunities were far too unequal, even before this crisis.

In March 2019, a year before the pandemic struck, I published a review into female entrepreneurship and the barriers to success, after having been commissioned by the Treasury.

The findings were stark.

Releasing the untapped potential of female business owners would boost the economy by £250billion, but women made up just a third of entrepreneurs and this fell to one in four among our most productive sectors, including technology.

The impetus from the review was to close the funding gap between male and female entrepreneurs, given that access to finance was the major source of this imbalance. 

The Government declared its ambition to increase the number of female entrepreneurs by 50 per cent by 2030.

To help, we launched £1billion of Female Entrepreneurship Funding for small and medium firms led by women.

That went hand-in-hand with tailored advice and long-term support for recipients.

But just two months later the country was in the grip of its first national lockdown. We met our target for lending under that scheme a full four years ahead of schedule, due to extraordinary demands placed on all businesses and the success of the Government lending schemes.

Female entrepreneurs need support. There have been inevitable additional pressures placed on women as schools have closed. 

Our research shows that 55 per cent of men said managing their business in the pandemic was particularly stressful. That figure rises to north of 70 per cent for female entrepreneurs.

Women are also nearly 20 per cent more likely than men to struggle with the demands of balancing work and family life. 

Most alarmingly, research by consultants McKinsey indicates that one in four women are now considering stepping back from their career.

The pandemic has compounded the difficulties and expanded the obstacles faced by many women. The problem is global.

US businesswoman Sheryl Sandberg, a top Facebook executive and founder of non-profit organisation Lean In, has warned in recent months that the pressures of the Covid-19 crisis ‘threaten to roll back the progress we have painstakingly made over the last five to ten years for women in the workplace’.

Heading off this threat is a challenge that should energise all of us. If women find themselves at even more of a professional disadvantage on the other side of this crisis, then we’ll be attempting to build an economic recovery while ignoring a huge pool of talent.

Encouraging firms led by women to invest at levels closer to their male counterparts will be good for the prosperity of the nation, contribute to the levelling up of the economy and help make the most the vast potential of our female entrepreneurs.