Madam Speaker, this being my first speech in the House as the session begins, I would like to start by welcoming our pages, who are new to the job, on behalf of all my colleagues, whom I encourage to be patient.
I would also like to thank my colleague for his speech and ask him a question.
The trade facilitation agreement, the TFA, is good for small and medium-sized enterprises. The World Bank estimates that women own between 8 million and 10 million of the SMEs in emerging markets, or 31% to 38% of all SMEs in the market. However, the average growth rate of women-owned businesses is much lower than that of SMEs run by men.
Can my colleague tell us more about how the WTO will support implementation of the TFA in developing countries? Will that support specifically involve promoting and improving access to capital for women entrepreneurs in developing countries?