Why the world needs more female entrepreneurs:))

COLUMNIST BURCH: Tory Burch has unveiled her writing chops in The Economist’s annual year-ahead issue, which hit newsstands this week. Burch, who was approached by the magazine’s editor Daniel Franklin, decided to pen an opinion piece entitled: “Why the world needs women entrepreneurs.” The designer was one of a handful of influential contributors — who also include Matt Damon; Sir Richard Branson; chef René Redzepi; Virginia Rometty, chief executive officer of IBM; Larry Fink, ceo of BlackRock; Ed Miliband, leader of the British Labour Party, and Park Geun-hye, president of South Korea — given the opportunity to write about a subject that compels them. Prior to this, Burch hadn’t ever contributed to a major print publication. “It was a huge honor for me,” Burch said. “I’ve admired The Economist for so long, and I really thought this was a topic that would make sense. It’s really about the work we do.” Burch, of course, was speaking about her philanthropic foundation, not her fashion label. Part of her passion, as she called it, is empowering women in the workplace. That made writing the article easier, but she admitted that she still found the process “very hard.” “I had a little help from my team,” she admitted, emphasizing that she wouldn’t be taking up a second career as a columnist anytime soon. “I admire writers.” But any sort of difficulty in the writing process effort didn’t come across in the prose, Franklin told WWD. “She submitted it and it was edited, but really only for length,” the editor said, admitting that he didn’t know much about her charitable works before he read the article. “I was open to any ideas that she had. This is what she wanted to write,” Franklin offered. “It’s always nice when somebody really has something to say.”