As we celebrate International Women’s Day, millions of rural women are being overlooked and their potential remains untapped. For too long, the narrative of economic growth has been dominated by urban centers, corporate boardrooms, and global trade corridors. Yet, hidden in the fields, villages, and community gatherings across Africa lies an untapped force, the economic power of rural women. These women are not merely participants in subsistence farming or informal trade; they are the architects of resilience, the custodians of local economies, and the quiet revolutionaries shaping the future of sustainable development.
A recent UN study estimates that around the world women and girls contribute 16 billion hours of unpaid care every day. Rural women manage households, cultivate land, and sustain community networks. Their labor feeds nations, their ingenuity drives micro-enterprises, and their collective action builds social safety nets where formal systems fail. Yet, their contributions remain undervalued, often invisible in GDP calculations and policy frameworks. The real question is not whether rural women have economic power, it is whether our systems are structured to recognize and invest in it. Recognizing and investing in this power is not charity, it is smart economics.
Recent investments, like the African Development Banks AFAWA initiative on financing women, have shown tangible results. In my homeland, the Gambia, Buzz Women Gambia has demonstrated what happens when rural women are given tools, knowledge, and confidence. Over 40,000 women have been trained, and 457 Beehives established—each one a hub of learning, entrepreneurship, and solidarity. Every data captured during training does not just represent numbers but lives transformed, families uplifted, and communities reimagined. Women who once doubted their ability to manage finances now run micro-businesses. Those who felt voiceless now lead community dialogues. The ripple effect is undeniable, empowered women empower others. We are on a journey to reach a 100000 women across the country.
Buzz Women’s model is simple yet profound. It brings learning to the doorstep of rural women, in their language, on their terms. It is grassroots empowerment at scale, proving that when women rise, entire communities rise with them.
The expansion of Buzz Women across Africa is more than organizational growth; it is the scaling of a philosophy. In Tanzania, Kenya, Senegal, Ivory Coast, and beyond, the movement is planting seeds of collective action and mutualism. By connecting rural women across borders, Buzz Women is building a continental network of changemakers who can influence policy, drive climate-smart agriculture, and champion renewable energy solutions tailored to women farmers.
This expansion positions rural women not as passive beneficiaries of aid, but as active leaders in Africa’s economic transformation. It reframes empowerment from a local intervention to a regional strategy, where women’s voices shape trade, sustainability, and governance.
If Africa is to unlock its full potential, it must recognize rural women as central to its economic future. Investment in their skills, access to renewable energy, and inclusion in policy frameworks is not optional, it is essential. The untold story of rural women’s economic power must be told, celebrated, and amplified until it becomes impossible to ignore. I have the firm believe that Africa’s economic market will not be built from the four corners of boardrooms alone, it will be built from rural markets, farms and cooperative led by women. This is not a social issue but Africa’s most overlooked investment opportunity.
Buzz Women’s journey from Gunjur, where I come from, in the West Coast Region of the Gambia to East and West Africa is proof that change is not only possible, it is inevitable when women lead. The question is no longer whether rural women can drive economic transformation, it is whether the world is ready to embrace their power?