Relationship between programmatic functional skilling and women’s socio-economic empowerment in Malaba Town council

Abstract

The study examined the relationship between programmatic functional skilling and socio-economic empowerment of women in Malaba Municipality. A cross-sectional survey design was adopted as a multi-method approach that can be combined with qualitative and quantitative data collection methods, correlation and descriptive approaches.  A total of 281 respondents were selected for the study using the random sampling method. Interview schedules (guides), questionnaires and a focus discussion guide were used in this study. The researcher organized the collected data according to the themes of the study, edited, coded and classified them. Using Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) software, version 22, the data were also sorted and ordered according to the frequency of similar responses (frequencies) and percentages were calculated, which formed the basis for the correlation analysis used to identify key variables such as women's socio-economic empowerment and functional skilling, thus forming the basis for data analysis, discussion, conclusions and recommendations. Taking the conclusions of the women and the leaders on the subject of skilling, it is obvious that no real attempts have been made to introduce women in Malaba Town Council to skills of any kind. And, because the majority of women attributed their predicament to a lack of knowledge, it is safe to conclude that the lack of efforts to teach women skills is largely to blame for their current socioeconomic situation. In other words, it is reasonable to argue that women lack empowerment because they lack skills. The fact that the women had no livelihoods or skills but were willing to be trained implies that they were yearning to engage in something profitable so that their lives may change for the better; this would occur through functional skilling.