NABW was established in 1990 and registered as an NGO to foster the participation of women in business enterprises through promotional support to existing and potential members. The organisation has its Head Office in Blantyre but operates in all districts of Malawi. It is a membership organisation and is registered as a Trust and is governed by an 11 member Board of Trustees. Its mission is 'to promote businesses belonging to women and to assist many more women to enter into business'. The organisation currently has a membership of 15 000 throughout Malawi. Its goals and objectives are as follows:
- To promote, improve and encourage the development of businesses owned by women
- To advise and inform members on matters affecting their interests.
- To upgrade the subsistence level of rural women entrepreneurs by forging linkages between urban and rural economic sectors
- To stimulate and maintain business women's involvement and participation in programmes and other national organisations to ensure that resources available for businesses in Malawi are properly co-ordinated
- To co-operate and liaise fully with the government so that the association is kept abreast with various priority projects for women and the available opportunities for training and credit.
NABW's activities consists of the provision of Business training, provision of Basic Technical training and the provision of credit. Beneficiaries are selected by the secretariat in consultation with the District committees. After selection the trainees are given business training as well as technical training. The business training covers business management, record keeping, stock control, etc while technical training covers the specific business that the group or individuals are going to do. These include bread making, poultry, fish farming, oil extraction, crafts etc. After the training the trainees are then considered for credit. Training is a prerequisite but not a qualification for consideration for credit. NABW now intend to open more business opportunities for women through ICT.
The target group for NABW is its members throughout Malawi. The majority of the members are in rural areas. All the members are women and should be running or interested in running a business.
NABW's main objective is to economically empower women in Malawi. In order to achieve this goal, they need to strengthen their capacity. The Hivos support enables them to increase their institutional capacity and to design adequate strategies.

Type organisatie	Membership organisation
Werkveld	Financial Services
Land	Malawi
Opgericht	2003
Hivos partner sinds	2003