- TRACKER -
Financial Opportunities for Female Entrepreneurs of Africa

Launched on November 6, 2022, this is the Thoughtfox tracker for financial opportunities for female entrepreneurs of Africa. This descriptive database is to be constantly updated, revised.

In case a grant or loan or award listed below has a fixed application schedule, we indicate the deadline. Most of these funding sources appear not to have a fixed schedule; so, you would just have to check the ones for which you or your organisation is eligible to apply.

Do inform us of any relevant information to be added here by sending a message via this form. Thanks.

Ladies: Start drafting your CV or resumé via an AI-powered free online application by clicking here. You may also create your complete professional profile there—and recruiters/funders may find you through it. The above online application has nothing to do with the following links.

About Her Culture (AHC): Grants worth up to USD 500 are given to ‘Caribbean & African women entrepreneurs whose businesses or projects are making a positive impact on culture + community. Women can be born in the Caribbean or Africa, or be of Caribbean or Africa descent.’ Grant applications are usually accepted before October 1 of each year; this year, 2024, you must apply in May. Click here to make your application.

African Women Development Fund (AWDF): Irreligious, apolitical, non-academic, non-profit, and non-government women-led organisations based and registered in an African country—and with at least three years of experience in managing projects intended to empower African females—are eligible to apply for AWDF grants. If an organisation adheres to all of the above criteria, then it can make an application for an AWDF grant by clicking here. The preceding link would also lead you to many documents detailing AWDF criteria further.

American Women for International Understanding (AWIU): Provides short-term project-specific grants to organizations dedicated to ‘advancement for women in the areas of education, skill training, health, entrepreneurship, and advocacy’ in developing countries. AWIU prefers projects that require no more than USD 5000; are women-led; durational; have ‘a quantifiable outcome’ and ‘a potential multiplier effect’; are backed by ‘two verifiable references’ and ‘recommended by International Women of Courage, personnel of the U.S. government or other individuals or entities favorably known to AWIU’. You can apply for a grant for your organisation by clicking here.

This organisation also ‘offers networking and educational opportunities for students in international fields and young women working on projects focused on empowering women and building women’s leadership globally’ via its AWIU Passport to the Future Program. One has to be 32 years or younger in order to apply for this opportunity.

Fonds pour les femmes Congolaises (FFCRDC): This Democratic Republic of the Congo-based organization has no online mechanism for grants; its webpage, however, does tell you to send your organisational proposal for a grant on the following email address: projets@ffcrdc.org. Or, you may send or bring a hard copy directly to FFCRDC offices in Kinshasa or Goma. The grants tend to be anywhere between USD 1000 & USD 5000.

The website does not indicate any deadlines nor outline the application process except to say that the grants are for non-government organizations focusing on women’s rights and empowerment in the DRC. You can contact them here for further information: contact@ffcrdc.org & +243822221195.

Rising Tide Africa (RTA): This is an elite Lagos-based organization that focuses on training African female investors into becoming richer investors via networking and exposure to newer upscaling infrastructures. RTA focuses on digital technological investments and enterprises led by African women; however, anybody could make an application to join it as mentor/investor/co-investor and/or trainer also. To check out the descriptions to these latter membership levels, click this link.

Seedstars Africa: These grants are for not for small entrepreneurs or start-ups, nor are they exclusive to women; they are for ‘high-growth companies active across Sub-Saharan Africa.’ Click here to apply for them.

Spark: This is a US-based, women-led, organization that provides grants to women-led grassroots organizations, not individual women. This organization has a relatively complicated circled-based model of grant giving; a how-to-guide is available in pdf format via this link. You can take a look at the organizations that have received previous grants from Spark by clicking here.

The Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF): To apply for a TEF grant as an African female entrepreneur, you have to be its network’s alum first. To become a part of the TEF network, click here.

Urgent Action Fund (UAF): This is a California-based coalition that provides two types of human-rights grants to gender activists (not ordinary individuals or social services) on an emergency basis: security & opportunity. These grants are meant to support ‘women and trans human rights defenders/activists or organizations led by women or trans activists when an unexpected situation arises that requires an immediate and time-urgent response to uphold human rights.’ One can apply to these grants online in any language, and get a response within 24 hours (even though an actual decision on the application may take up to 10 days). Click here to read further about UAF and apply.

Womenpreneur: These grants are currently offered, based upon competitive bidding, to female entrepreneurs from Nigeria, Ghana, Zambia, Rwanda, Mozambique, Kenya, South Africa, Democratic Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone and the Gambia. You can read more about their eligibility and application requirements here.

Women Fund Tanzania (WFT): WFT offers grants to non-governmental (multi-thematic) feminist organisations of Tanzania. Click here to apply for a grant for your organisation; before you apply, do read the full eligibility requirements by clicking here. Applications are usually accepted in March each year.

Zidisha Incorporated: This is a US-based nonprofit microcredit agency founded in 2009 by Julia Kurnia. While not restricted to helping out (small-scale) African female entrepreneurs, Zidisha appears to be particularly useful to them. This is how it works:

A small entrepreneur or wannabe entrepreneur (presumably from the Global South) is expected to make a proposal to get a small loan; this proposal is expected to be seen on the Zidisha platform by individual lenders from any part of the world (but presumably from the Global North). If a lender finds the proposal promising, then the two interact online through Zidisha, and the lender personally grants a small loan to the borrower for a period of time; once the time period is over—and presuming that the borrower’s business has developed well enough in the meantime—the borrower is expected to loan the same amount (or more) via Zidisha to another borrower looking for a small grant. Zidisha calls it ‘the pay it forward concept’.

There is no deadline for loan applications. Check out Zidisha’s webpage and its procedure here.