Women's Entrepreneurship Day 2021

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Ms. MENG. Madam Speaker, I rise today to speak in honor of Women's Entrepreneurship Day which is celebrated around the world each year on November 19th.

Women-owned U.S. firms make up nearly 20 percent of all firms that employ people and this number is growing. There are nearly 13 million women-owned firms and they employ close to 10 million people. As a testament to their success, women-owned firms reported revenues of nearly $1.9 trillion. This is truly astounding and shows you how vital women are to the economy. I applaud these women entrepreneurs and their economically vital businesses.

I also applaud Wendy Diamond, who has personally spearheaded the Women's Entrepreneurship Day movement. Since her campaign launched in 2013, her Women's Entrepreneurship Day Organization has annually funded one thousand impoverished women with microloans to start their entrepreneurial journey in Nicaragua, India and Africa, hosted a nationwide entrepreneurship training program for 60,000 female college students and early-stage entrepreneurs in Saudi Arabia, initiated and funded the premiere Women's Disability Cohort Pitch Competition, a visionary program that raises funding opportunities for women marginalized by their disabilities in partnership with 2Gether International, provided financial literacy education to one thousand rural women in the Philippines, and partnered with a Uruguayan university to offer scholarships to young women.

Women's Entrepreneurship Day is now celebrated in 144 countries and 65 universities and colleges internationally, with numerous global ambassadors. The Women's Entrepreneurship Day mission is to empower the nearly four billion women worldwide to be catalysts of change and uplift the over 250 million girls living in poverty around the world.

As in past years, the Women's Entrepreneurship Day Organization Pioneer Awards recognizes, and honors distinguished women who are leaders and innovators across multiple categories with inspiring accomplishments. This year's honorees include:

Cathie Wood, Founder and CEO of ARK Investment Management, LLC-- Financial Pioneer Award

Jeni Britton Bauer, CEO/Founder Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams--Culinary Pioneer Award

Judith Heumann, International Disability Rights Advocate, The Heumann Perspective--Human Rights Pioneer Award

Mona Scott-Young, CEO of Monami Productions--Entertainment Pioneer Award

The Honorable Kathy Hochul, 57th & first female Governor of New York State--Government Pioneer Award

Nadja Swarovski, Chair and Founder of Atelier Swarovski and Chair of Swarovski Foundation--Fashion Pioneer Award

Dawn Dickson-Akpoghene, CEO and Founder of PopCom--Technology Pioneer Award

Madam Speaker, I urge the entire House to recognize these remarkable role models, and to celebrate Women's Entrepreneurship Day this year and every year moving forward.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source