Make some room in the boys’ club: It is now mandatory to have female board members in every company and government agency in the United Arab Emirates, according to a new instruction from the U.A.E. government.

The Global Entrepreneurship Summit – Entrepreneurial Ventures of Arabia (GES-EVA) held at the Dubai World Trade Centre put the spotlight on promoting women entrepreneurship in the SME sector regionally. The experts said that it is imperative to continue to create the foundation for promoting women entrepreneurship to enable them to excel and develop their businesses by learning from the experiences of the successful Arab women entrepreneurs.

Diversity in boardrooms through a greater presence of women is essential for improving the quality of corporate governance in the region, and women need to be empowered and their contributions recognised in family-owned, public as well as corporate enterprises in order for the next generation to take their rightful places on boards across the region, panelists agreed over three panel discussions at the third Arab Women Leadership Forum, organised by the Dubai Women Establishment.