RURAL WOMEN BECOMING ENTREPRENEURS

Women setting up grocery shops, power loom units as well as flour and porridge mills will strengthen the rural economy. Start up Village Entrepreneurship programme has benefitted 11,454 rural women so far

Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s efforts to empower rural women and make them selfreliant during the last four and a half years have started paying its dividends with more and more of them turning to entrepreneurship. As many as 11,454 women of the state have benefited so far from the Start Up Village Entrepreneurship Programme (SVEP) of the Government, according to official statistics.

In the financial year 2020-21, the beneficiaries of the programme included women hailing from Akbarpur block of Ambedkar Nagar, Bankati block of Basti, Pipraich block of Gorakhpur and Sewapuri block of Varanasi. Prior to this, women belonging to different blocks of nine districts benefitted.

It is noteworthy that the SVEP was launched to strengthen women's groups in UP while accelerating economic development of villages and eliminating poverty and unemployment from there.

Women in rural areas of the state are setting up grocery shops, powerloom units as well as flour and porridge mills, strengthening the rural economy. These efforts are making villagers in general financially stronger than before. Also, the National Rural Livelihood Mission has been playing a vital role in motivating rural women of UP to start small industries.

Since 2017, the Government has helped several groups of women set up small industries and enterprises in 19 blocks of 19 districts.

FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE BEING GIVEN TO SET UP SINGLE AND COMMUNITY ENTERPRISES

Under the Start Up Village Entrepreneurship Programme (SVEP), the State Government helps women’s groups in setting up individual as well as community enterprises.

For setting up a single enterprise, women are given loans ranging from Rs 10,000 to Rs 1 lakh whereas for setting up a community industry, a loan of Rs 1 lakh to Rs 5 lakh is being given to women’s groups.

The ratio of women and men working in these industries is 60:40 respectively. The Government also ensures that the men working in the units are related to women of the group. A sizeable number of the women of the state are also working in manufacturing, trading and service sectors.