A global consultancy firm, Palladium, has offered $40 million in grant to Nigerian female entrepreneurs in a bid to bridge the financing gap for small businesses in Sub-Saharan Africa.
The fund, called “Palladium Impact Fund I”, is targeted at 60 per cent of women in Nigeria, Ghana and Kenya whose businesses revolve around agribusiness and off-grid clean energy. It intends to create 3,500 full-time jobs while economically empowering 500,000 rural households.
The Fund will be supervised by Palladium which is investing $5million of its capital into the projects. Other investors are expected to include foundations, family offices, pension funds, and institutional investors. Palladium will utilise the additional $5 million to strictly make investments of between $250,000 and $2 million into small companies.
Head of Impact Investments at Palladium, Andrew Tillery, explained that the firm’s decision to focus on women, this time, was because women participate more in agricultural activities.
