Melanne Verveer

[Commentary] “Do you know how many great business ideas die in the bank parking lot?” a Colorado woman asked then-First Lady Hillary Clinton 20 years ago. The aspiring entrepreneur had just been turned down, again, for a credit line critical to her technology startup. Today, women still struggle to access the capital they need to spur economic development.

While women entrepreneurs are now understood to be an accelerator of global growth, their difficulty accessing capital is a pernicious global brake. The opportunity cost is profound, given that women’s economic impact is magnified by a "multiplier effect"; women are more likely than men to plough earnings back into their communities, fostering prosperity and stability.

[Ambassador Verveer is executive director of Georgetown University’s Institute for Women, Peace and Security and partner at Seneca Point Global, a global women strategy firm; Azzarelli is a partner at Seneca Point Global]