Youth and Gender Cabinet Secretary Sicily Kariuki has issued cheques worth Sh14.9 million for the Uwezo Fund, Women Enterprise Development Funds and Youth Enterprise Development Fund in Thika.

She encouraged sensitization and public awareness activities to ensure efficiency in loan access, repayment and recovery mechanism which include regular field activities.

“As the Cabinet Secretary in charge of economic empowerment programmes for youth and women, I reaffirm my commitment towards ensuring that more Kenyans access Government funding to enable them realise their full potential to accelerate their individual as well as the overall country’s economic growth” she stated.

The Uwezo Fund seeks to expand access to finances in promotion of youth, women, and persons living with disability.

To date, Thika has received Sh17,168,599 Uwezo Fund allocations which have been disbursed to 146 groups comprising 3,581 individuals.

The Women Enterprise Fund has since inception disbursed cumulatively Sh8.96 billion to 1,261,597 individual women across the country with a loan repayment rate of 89 percent across the country.