Looks like us Irish women are growing more confident by the day. According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) report for 2012, Ireland’s female entrepreneurs are becoming more optimistic about the growth of their businesses.

The report shows that the number of female early stage entrepreneurs who expect to have at least ten employed people within five years has almost doubled, to 23 percent.

Women across Ireland are being encouraged and assisted by the County and City Enterprise Boards in starting their own business in an effort to increase the number of female entrepreneurs in Ireland, which is currently around half the rate of male entrepreneur start-ups.

However Ireland still has a much higher rate of men setting up their own company than women.

The report revealed that level of Irish women’s entrepreneurial activity has remained at steady flow but the positive expectations for their businesses have increased very significantly, especially with regards to future employment prospects.

So what is being done to encourage more women to have more positive business outlooks?

The County and City Enterprise Boards are offering a range of supports to small and medium sized businesses to encourage more women to use their skills to set up a business. The plan to kickstart this with their National Women’s Enterprise Day.

“The aim of National Women’s Enterprise Day is to improve confidence among female entrepreneurs and women thinking of setting up a business” said Eamon Ryan of the County and City Enterprise Boards and chair of the organising committee for the event.

“One of the main reasons cited by women as a barrier to start up is a lack of confidence. The fact that more women are starting businesses reflects the increased effort among policy makers and development agencies to encourage women to become involved in entrepreneurial activity and to be ambitious for their new businesses”.

The two keynote speakers at the event are Ramona Nicholas from the TV show Dragon’s Den, who runs Cara Pharmacies and Alyson Hogg, Founder and CEO of Vita Liberata.

Other successful female entrepreneurs involved in the event are: Rosaria Piseri of AlgaAran in Donegal, who produces a range of organic seaweed products; Mags Kirwan of Goatsbridge Irish Trout from Kilkenny; internationally acclaimed milliner Davina Lynch from Cavan and Pauline Naughton of P and G Cards in Roscommon.

National Women's Enterprise Day takes place on October 16th and 17th in the Heritage Hotel in Portlaoise. You can find out more about the event on their website here.