Business Priorities for Women's Enterprise in London

The London Development Agency (LDA) commissioned the 'Business Priorities for Women Enterprise in London' consultation report because of strong evidence, which showed that women were under represented in terms of business ownership.

In London 52% of the population consists of women, however only 11% of all businesses could be categorized as female owned (London Business Annual Survey 2004).

As women are the most significant under represented group in UK enterprise, the Government's Strategic framework for Women's Enterprise set out a long term vision to build a culture for enterprise with the overall objective of increasing the numbers of women starting and growing businesses.

It was noted in the Government's Strategic Framework For Women's Enterprise that some common factors, such as the lack of appropriate business support, affordable and appropriate business premises, access to finance and affordable childcare provision, present barriers to the successful transition for many women into business and self employment.

It was for this reason that the Enterprise Support Unit of the LDA began initial consultation to develop 'Business Priorities for Women's Enterprise in London'. Through a series of workshops between June and September 2005, the LDA consulted a number of partners on their responses to six key themes for women and enterprise, namely:

• Business Support and Advice
• Business Finance
• Private and public sector procurement
• Business Premises
• Coordination of Information, Data and Research
• International partnerships and International Trade and Development

The draft executive summary highlights feedback from an initial workshops and consultation on these themes which will enable the LDA and their partners to further consult in contributing to the development of a co-ordinated 'Regional Action Plan' for Women's Enterprise.

The consultation process will take place until March 31st 2006, after which a full report will be published.

Please send us your comments/suggestions on the Business Priorities for Women's Enterprise in London.

Draft Executive Summary

• Business Priorities for Women's Enterprise in London Draft Consultation Executive Summary PDF
• Business Priorities for Women's Enterprise in London Draft Consultation Executive Summary RTF

Downloadable Documents

PDF: You may download a free Acrobat viewer from Adobe. Adobe resources for accessibility are also available. The LDA is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

RTF: RTF files may not retain the formatting and layout of the original document and normally do not include graphics. They can be read by most word processor software.