Young women's economic empowerment: What BLOOM dialogues in Tanzania and Somaliland are teaching us

Authors: Hodan Ibraahim (World Vision Somalia), Godfrey Kisemba (World Vision Tanzania) and Jennifer King (World Vision Canada)

What does it take for young women who want to work, earn, and support their families to fully participate in the economy?

That question emerged in recent BLOOM community dialogues in Burao and Hargeisa, Somaliland. It was also part of a youth dialogue in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The two conversations started at different points but generated complementary insights on young women’s economic empowerment.

What is a BLOOM dialogue?

Skills alone do not get a young woman a job if her family, community, or the education and employment systems don’t support her. So, the BLOOM Africa project, which improves the economic empowerment of marginalized adolescent girls and young women, also addresses the beliefs and power imbalances surrounding them. It operates in Somaliland, Tanzania and Rwanda.

Community dialogues are one way it does this, alongside awareness campaigns and youth-led advocacy. They are an essential part of BLOOM’s model to shift gender norms by creating space for young people, parents, faith and community leaders, and government officials to reflect and speak honestly about how gender and social expectations shape who gains skills, income, and opportunity.

So far, dialogues have taken place in Somaliland and Tanzania. The purpose is shared, but the conversations differ by design. The Somaliland dialogues focused on community norms, household roles, faith perspectives, and young women’s everyday economic realities. In Tanzania, a recent youth dialogue connected the conversation to policy advocacy.

Somaliland: Community dialogues open space to question gender norms

More than 600 participants took part, including faith and traditional leaders, teachers, women entrepreneurs, youth, parents, community members, and government representatives. Together they explored what helps, or holds back, women’s economic empowerment.

Girls are getting educated, but jobs aren’t following

Girls’ access to education has improved considerably, and in some schools, girls now outnumber boys. Yet these gains are not translating equally into jobs, leadership, or economic opportunity. Adolescent girls and young women still face limited access to market-relevant skills, clan-based recruitment practices that favour men, employer gender stereotypes, safety concerns, unpaid care expectations, and hiring practices that overlook local youth.

A young woman participant said, “We are communities who are stuck with the clan system, and the majority of employment opportunities require support from clan leaders.”

Another said, “I am the eldest daughter in my family, and after I graduated, I asked my uncle, who works in the public sector, to help me find a job. He asked about my younger brother and said he would help him instead because he would support the family. No one is helping me find a job because I am a girl.”

Faith leaders draw a clear line between religion and culture

Islamic faith leaders emphasized that Islam supports women’s rights to own property, run businesses, control their earnings, and contribute economically. They pointed to Khadija bint Khuwaylid, the first wife of the Prophet Muhammad, as an example of a highly successful businesswoman. They agreed that restrictions on women’s economic activity come mainly from social and cultural norms and expectations, rather than religious teachings.

Women’s economic participation comes with hidden costs

Many women run small businesses to meet family needs while also shouldering heavy unpaid caregiving responsibilities. Limited time, credit, financial literacy, and business skills make it harder to grow their businesses. One woman participant said, “Nowadays, due to financial constraints and men failing to perform their duties as providers, women take on both the provider role and care work, yet no one appreciates it.”

Women entrepreneurs also described having to work harder to earn trust in business negotiations and financial dealings, where their abilities are often questioned.

Men have a critical role to play as allies

Participants described what allyship looks like in practice: men sharing care work, encouraging women’s ambitions, believing in women’s capabilities, and making household decisions jointly with their wives.

The Somaliland dialogues ended with practical community action plans that included awareness campaigns, engagement with faith and community leaders, youth sessions, and efforts to promote more equal sharing of household responsibilities.

Tanzania: A youth dialogue turns gender learning into policy action

In Dar es Salaam, close to 100 young people, government representatives, and other stakeholders met to discuss how training, job pathways, finance, and public procurement (government purchasing of goods and services) can become safer and more accessible for young women and marginalized youth with skills and ambition.

Youth are ready to lead, but systems must be safer and more supportive

Participants found that a lack of motivation or capacity does not cause many barriers to youth and young women’s economic empowerment. They come from weak protection systems, limited support for young mothers, unsafe or informal training-to-work pathways, and economic opportunities that are difficult for young people to reach.

Training alone is not enough

Young people urged that they need practical routes from skills to livelihoods: apprenticeships, start-up capital, tools, workspaces, financial services, market access and links to employers. They identified structural barriers, such as limited capital, weak transitions from training to work, informal and low-paying work, safety concerns, restrictive gender norms and limited networks. Youth should not be expected to overcome these barriers on their own. Governments and institutions must make labour markets safer, more inclusive and more responsive to the realities of youth.

Policy gaps block young women’s participation

Adolescent girls, young women, and other participants identified the most significant gaps:

• No mandatory policies against gender-based violence (GBV) and sexual harassment in technical and vocational education and training (TVET) institutions.
• Weak confidential reporting, referral and response systems that put survivors first.
• Limited options for pregnant learners and young mothers to return to training.
• Gaps in maternity support, childcare, breastfeeding spaces and flexible learning.

Available opportunities need to become accessible opportunities

Government and financial institution representatives described several economic opportunities: the 10% Local Government Authority loan scheme, NMB small-entrepreneur financing, YES Portal loans, and a 30% public procurement allocation for youth, women, and persons with disabilities. But many young people cannot access these opportunities because they don’t know the options exist, or they cannot meet the requirements for documentation, registration, group formation, and business formalization. One girl participant said, “Indeed, we hear about the loan opportunities provided by the local council, but we have never benefited from them. As for those from the Ministry of Youth, I have never even heard about them.”

Three policy priorities

Participants agreed on a set of policy and systems changes. Three stood out as priorities:

• TVET institutions and the responsible ministry: Adopt mandatory policies against GBV and sexual harassment, with confidential, survivor-centred reporting and referral.
• TVET institutions: Create re-entry and support policies for pregnant students and young mothers.
• Financial institutions and local government: Make financing, business support, and public procurement easier for young women and youth to access, including simpler requirements and better information.

Participants also called for safe, structured apprenticeships; more young women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) and technical trades; and better coordination among TVET institutions, employers, government, and financial institutions.

What the two dialogues tell us about young women's economic empowerment

So, what does it take for young women who want to work, earn, and support their families to fully participate in the economy?

In two dialogues with two different starting points, the answers were connected. In Somaliland, a conversation about norms and faith identified a structural barrier: clan-based hiring. In Tanzania, a conversation about policy and finance kept returning to restrictive gender norms and safety concerns.

Communities play a critical role in challenging the traditional norms that hold women back from full economic empowerment, and institutions need to change the gendered rules, both official and unspoken, that keep opportunities out of reach. Without both, young women are left to address issues on their own.

BLOOM is a five-year, $20 million CAD initiative funded by Global Affairs Canada. It is implemented by World Vision Canada, World Vision country offices, and local partners in Rwanda, Tanzania and Somalia (Somaliland). Its goal is to strengthen economic opportunities and agency for marginalized adolescent girls and young women.