South Sudan - Private sector development in a fragile context - Capacity Building and access to finance youth and women

The Private Sector Development in Fragile Context: Capacity Building and Access to Finance for Youth and Women (PSDFC) aims to increase employment opportunities, market access and incomes for women and youth in South Sudan. The PSDFC project is complementing other Bank funded projects to maximize the impact on job creation. It will contribute to sustain peace and development in South Sudan, widening the opportunities for women and youth, and engage them through entrepreneurial skills enhancement. Specifically, this will address:(i) low levels of business and financial skills including literacy on business management; (ii) challenges in accessing financing, diversifying and sustaining Micro and Small Enterprises (MSEs); (iii) inaccessibility to services of good quality; iv) limited access to information about market demands and trends; (v) absence of organised collective efforts to meet market requirements; (vi) low productivity; and (vii) capacity challenges of government and private sector institutions for private sector and entrepreneurship development. The project will be implemented over a period of 36 months in Western Bahr-el-ghazal and Western Equatoria where activities in the above value chains are viable. Its total cost is UA 1,500,000 (equivalent to USD 2,145,000) financed through Transition Support Facility (TSF) pillar III.