The North-West Women Empowerment Forum (NOWWEF): an Institutional Strengthening in Women Development in the North-West Region of Cameroon, 2005 – 2015

Before the 1990s, the role of North-West women in the economic activities of the province was very minimal. They were mainly involved in the food production sector, which did not contribute much to the family’s cash income. The 1990 laws of freedom of association in Cameroon (Law N0 90/053/19/12/1990) were an impetus for the formation of women’s groups, whose activities now form the bedrock of rural livelihoods. Thus, the North-West Women Empowerment Forum (NOWWEF) as a National Women’s Forum was created in 2007 with objectives to advance the leadership, cultural, and economic empowerment of women in the North-West Region (NWR). This forum connects women of significant and diverse achievement for the purpose of idea exchange, inspiration, and learning. As an empirical study of the situation of women in the North-West of Cameroon, this paper is particularly focused on the women’s struggle to empower themselves and improve their quality of life through engagement and how the government and other development partners are helping to promote this.Thus, it also aims at in-depth descriptions of the activities of NOWWEF, which stands as an umbrella that unites all the women from different areas of the region and also acts as an institutional strengthening for gender equality and women’s empowerment in the region. Content analysis has been adopted in the collection and processing of data. Our materials embody both primary and secondary data collected from private archives, interviews, books, journals, articles, and academic works.