7th April 2005: Women business owners are protesting against the delay in a Small Business Administration program formed by 2000 Small Business Reauthorization Act. This program allows agencies to restrict some contracts to women-owned small business certified as disadvantaged SBA.

However, the program still has not identified the industries where women are underrepresented.

The Center for Women's Business Research has estimated that 48 percent of private companies are owned by women; of which only 2.5 percent of federal contracts are awarded to women-owned small businesses, according to the SBA.

The Congress had decided in 1994 to lay down a government wide goal of giving 5 percent of government contracts to women-owned enterprises.

It has been found out by the program that women–owned businesses find it troublesome to break federal contracting.

A recent survey has found that only 20 percent of women are federal contractors. Of the 48 percent of private companies owned by women only 2.5 percent of them are awarded as federal contractors.

This may be because most of the woman-owned firms are quite young and therefore not familiar with the working pattern of federal marketplace.

In 2001, the Government Accountability Office found out that the government has fallen short of its goal. The percentage of prime contracts presented to women-owned small business has not grown between 1996 and 1999.