Eighty female secondary school students from Lautém and Oecusse municipalities are involved in the Skills Training for Economic Participation (FAPE) project to prepare them in financial management for their future lives.
Minister of Education (ME), Dulce de Jesus Soares, said the project is supported by UN Women in partnership with the Ministry of Education to provide opportunities for female students, particularly in rural areas, to develop their skills in financial management.
“Through the FAPE project, we have engaged 80 female students, especially from rural areas in Lautém and Oecusse municipalities, to strengthen their knowledge in financial management and in starting small businesses,” she said.
She explained that the project has been implemented over six months, and UN Women and the Ministry of Education will monitor the results of its implementation, with the possibility of expanding it to schools in other municipalities.
“This project is very important because it contributes to students’ understanding of financial literacy, entrepreneurship and digital skills,” Minister Soares emphasised.
She added that FAPE supports young rural women to strengthen their professional and entrepreneurial competencies, preparing them to enter the market and advancing their skills for economic participation.
Meanwhile, student Maia Gonçalves from Nino Konis Santana General Secondary School in Lautém municipality said the project has greatly contributed to helping young women prepare their capacity to manage small businesses.
“Through this project I learned how I can further develop the small business I already had before,” she said at the Ministry of Education building in Dili.
She explained that her small business involves selling iced drinks at Nino Konis Santana General Secondary School in Lautém. The business was created after she previously received training from UN Women in Lautém, and she eventually developed the idea using her own capital of US$500.
“The new ideas I gained from this project have further supported my small business,” student Gonçalves said.She hopes that the other participants in the training will make good use of the opportunity to develop their knowledge and create their own small businesses.
