Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - A one-year management trainingcourse for some 200 female entrepreneurs has just been completed under aproject run by Tinh Thuong One Member Limited Liability MicrofinanceInstitution (TYM) and the New York-based Citi Foundation.

Most of the entrepreneurs who attended the coursewere involved in agriculture and handicrafts in the provinces of Nam Dinh, VinhPhuc, Thanh Hoa, Nghe An and Hung Yen.

They were given the opportunity to learn about marketing,human resource management, group work, decision making, financial managementand business planning.

During classes with experts from the International LabourOrganisation and the Vietnam Women’s Academy, the female entrepreneurs alsolooked at case studies and shared their real-life business experience.

Speaking at a workshop on July 18, TYM General Director DuongThi Ngoc Linh said that TYM originated from the Tinh Thuong fund launched bythe Vietnam Women’s Union in 1992 to help the Government’s hunger eliminationand poverty reduction programme while improving women’s status within andoutside the home.

TYM provides preferential loans or microfinance forlow-income households, especially poor and vulnerable women. TYM also helps tocollect its members’ savings which are sent daily, weekly or monthly and can bewithdrawn at any time.

Up to last year, TYM had handed out more than 1.3 millionloans worth 10.6 trillion VND (495 million USD) to more than 144,000 clients.Its outstanding loans last year reached 1 trillion VND (44 million USD).

Linh said that TYM had helped over 100,000 women escapepoverty, and about 7,000 of them had become entrepreneurs, which had drivenTYM’s leaders to consider a project to improve the management skills of theseemerging businesswomen.

“They have real-life experiences but lack formal businessknowledge,” Linh said, adding that once they were equipped with the propertools, they would be able to run their businesses more effectively.

Pham Thi Hong, a TYM member from Tinh Gia district in thecentral province of Thanh Hoa, said that before attending TYM’s trainingclasses, she had never thought about creating a website or Facebook page toadvertise her wooden furniture products.

Nguyen Thi An, a peanut oil producer from Hung Nguyen districtin the central province of Nghe An, said that she liked the TYM trainingclasses because she had learned more about customers, market prices andnegotiations.

“The classes gave me the chance to meet and learn from otherbusinesswomen. They’re great!,” An said.

In 2011, Duong Thi Tuyet, a TYM member from the northernprovince of Nam Dinh, was one of six micro-entrepreneurs honouredinternationally with the Global Micro-Entrepreneur Award for her coppermoulding business.

The New York-based Citi Foundation, a member of global bankCiti, works to promote economic progress and improve the lives of people inlow-income communities around the world.-VNS/VNA