§2: Creating a Suitable Platform for Economic Empowerment of Women 854- In order to create a suitable platform for economic empowerment of women, a study was carried out on the state of affairs of female entrepreneurship in Cameroon in 2016 with the aim to draw up a National Policy of Female Entrepreneurship. The No. 1 priority of this policy is to increase opportunities for decent employment and income-generating activities for women. While waiting for this policy to be adopted, a National Action Plan for the Development of Female Entrepreneurship (PANDEF 2017-2020) was designed with the support of ILO in view of creating suitable conditions for the development of female entrepreneurship. A: Development of Female Entrepreneurship 855- To promote female entrepreneurship, Government raised funds from partners to implement PANDEF. The goal was to launch programmes aimed at strengthening managerial capacities of female managers or work with partners to mainstream gender in programmes and projects with an entrepreneurial dimension. 856- In this light, the Support Programme for the Promotion of female Entrepreneurship (PAPEF) which seeks to grant women access to financial services at affordable costs moved to the final phase in 2017 with the signing of a loan agreement of CFAF7,000,000,000 between the Government and the Development Bank of the Central African States. Moreover, the Project Gender and Economic Empowerment of Women under the Support programme in the transport sector, phase I: Development of the road Batchenga-Ntui-Yoko-Lena began since 2014. It includes specific support to various entrepreneurial activities of women and dwells on aspects such as capacity building, provision of agro-pastoral kits to female cooperatives. 857- Activities on gender mainstreaming involved the development of aspects which bring added value to women’s activities within projects. To this effect, there was the launching by the Norms and Standardization Agency (ANOR) in collaboration with Reseau Normalisation et Franchophonie of activities of the “Women and Standardization” Project and the Women and Standardization National Unit in Cameroon (CNFN-Cam) to sensitize women on the importance of standards and quality. 858 Also, there was the promotion of female migration from the informal sector where they are the more important in number426 to the formal economy through support for the creation of cooperatives. A joint project between ILO and Interpatronal Group of Cameroon the Cameroon Association of Employers (GICAM) to the tune of 180,000,000 FCFA427 was launched in Douala in October 2016, to train 300 women in « Business Management Skills » and supervise female managers. 859- Government took appropriate measures to guarantee equality between women and men in terms of taxation. There is no disparity in the charging of taxes on the wages of women and men. The Public Contract’s Code makes no distinction between a male and a female contracting party when it comes to paying taxes. For example, payment of Value Added Tax is a general and impersonal. The same goes for the Law on the financial regime of the State. B: Promoting and Supporting Jobs and Economic Activities of Women 860- Various axes of economic empowerment of women were structured around capacity building, appraisal and management of female know-how including their domestic functions, support to create income generating activities especially in the agricultural sector. To follow426 EDS MICS 5 revealed that 34% of women were working in the agricultural sector against 66% in the non agricultural sector, with variables depending on rural (57%) or urban area. 427 That is, 274 809, 17 Euro. 142