The FACEJ project supports young people leaving technical, vocational, or higher education to get started with entrepreneurship in Mali. The project also supports young entrepreneurs who need assistance in developing their existing businesses. The project is funded by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark (Danida) and co-financed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands.
The FACEJ project is implemented through our partner SwissContact in Mali in collaboration with several local facilitators such as incubators, NGOs, Business Development Centers, and four banks. FACEJ is implemented in urban and peri-urban areas in the regions of Sikasso, Bamako, Koulikoro, Ségou, Tombouctou, Mopti/Sévaré and Kita and has a span of 3,5 years, concluding in December 2022.
The distribution of validated business plans is divided across the following seven sectors: Services, Agri-food processing, Agriculture/farming, Construction/crafts, Environment/Energy Information, Communications Technology (ICT), and Prevention and response to the Covid-19 crisis.
Impacts:
- As per 2021, a total of 1,716 business plans have been developed and assessed, of which 1,259 (76.2% of the total goal of 2022) have been validated. Here, 480 (38%) of the business plans are from female entrepreneurs.
- FACEJ has also helped to create 3 075 direct jobs in the intervention areas, where 47% of the jobs created are for women.
- We work with 62 partners who have also received diverse forms of capacity building through projects to ensure they can support young entrepreneurs both before and after they get their business plan funded.
Learn more about the FACEJ programme here
