Home News “We Lift 3”: Over 200 participating businesswomen to benefit from new IT...
Following the United Nations’ (UN) theme for International Women’s Day 2023, “DigitALL: Innovation and Technology for Gender Equality,” participants of “We Lift 3” will be introduced to new Information Technology (IT) opportunities, Human Services and Social Security Minister Vindhya Persaud told reporters on Thursday.
“We Lift 3”, a Human Services and Social Security Ministry initiative, is a two-day women-led business exhibition that opens on April 15 and 16 at the MovieTowne Parking Lot, and is set to surpass the scale and standards of the previous two iterations.
“The programme that is planned is entirely different from any other year [as] we are focusing on IT [since] the year by the UN has been earmarked as DigitALL,” Minister Persaud said. “So we’re doing a very special moment, or moments, with young women, making sure that they enter that space of digital technology using influencers from within the Ministry.”
From the first “We Lift” event to the third, the Ministry launched the Women’s Innovation and Investment Network (WIIN) app, a component of the WIIN programme that is dedicated to providing Guyanese women with the training and tools to help them attain financial freedom and security.
“We Lift 3” is not only a chance for business owners to access a wider range of clientele but also to work on the marketing, packaging and promotion of their products. As such, the Human Services and Social Security Ministry is working to offer exhibitors an opportunity to sell their products on the WIIN app as well. 
Adding to the Ministry’s programme to Guyanese women and female business owners, a new, free programme is set to launch at the weekend event.
“We are going to be launching a very, very exciting thing on the opening day of We Lift 3 where women will have another opportunity handed to them free of cost,” Persaud said.
Persaud added that the vision going forward is to ensure that the country has more women trained in niche areas where they can fill voids that exist in their communities, more consortiums set up by women, more women getting into typically male-dominated fields, more women taking their products out of Guyana and more women having the opportunity to have the “Made in Guyana” seal assigned to them by the Guyana National Bureau of Standards (GNBS).
“There are lots of good things that I want to see come out of this but more importantly is for women to not limit themselves, put themselves into a traditional box or [for] women not seeing themselves as bosses [or] entrepreneurs, to see themselves as being able to carve out their own identity and really make a name and a space for themselves in the country,” Persaud remarked.
“Because our country is on such a fast-paced course of development, I don’t think any woman should lose out on this opportunity,” Persaud said.
“We Lift 3” runs from 11:00h to 18:30h each day. The opening ceremony is at 11:00h today, with graduates of the WIIN programme also participating in a graduation ceremony throughout the day.
“Bring out literally everyone because there’s something for everyone. Walk in sample something really nice to eat and then meander all the way through till you find yourself picking up some good services that might be transformative in your life,” the Human Services Minister said, adding that admission into the event is free.
“Head to the Ministry of Human Services and Social Security’s arena, learn about all our services, access it and if you’ve never thought about registering for WIIN then register on site,” Persaud said.
