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@article{191726,
        author = {Dr. Hema Naik},
        title = {Women’s entrepreneurship in rural areas –innovation, sustainability and empowerment},
        journal = {International Journal of Innovative Research in Technology},
        year = {2026},
        volume = {12},
        number = {8},
        pages = {7757-7760},
        issn = {2349-6002},
        url = {https://ijirt.org/article?manuscript=191726},
        abstract = {This paper examines the key aspects of rural women’s entrepreneurship and focuses on brining women empowerment through innovative policy interventions and sustainability initiatives. Rural Women entrepreneurship is considered as an imperative factor in the upward economic development of a nation. Rural Women entrepreneurship supports in harnessing local resources, provides viable economic alternatives, reduces migration to urban centres and enhances the avenues of revenue generation for rural women. It also supports in tackling socio-cultural barriers surrounding rural women. The rapid feminization of the Indian agriculture is seen as nearly 80% of the rural women are engaged in agriculture and related work. This huge proportion of women has led to the high growth of number of women farmers shifting gears to pursue entrepreneurship. They are seen moving from usual tilling jobs to entrepreneurial jobs pursuing it as an additional income generative choice. Several State and Union Governments along with collaborative support from private NGO institutions have encouraged rural women through offering financial, training and marketing access support to augment entrepreneurial leadership. However, despite their high potential, rural women face challenges of limited literacy, financial constraints, poor motivation and poor digital awareness. Established Indian socio-cultural compositions also have a propensity to limit women to traditional gender roles rather than encourage them to assume entrepreneurial roles. The fact that rural women entrepreneurs work as part time entrepreneurs along with their wider livelihood work also hinders them from being seriously considered as entrepreneurs. There is a need for designing policies with that cater to the rural women specific business demands, providing rural women with better representation in small micro enterprises, business associations and business panels etc will assist in addressing rural women entrepreneurship barriers more specifically. There is a need for strengthening ongoing support mechanisms, initiating tailored approaches and creation of a supportive eco system for constructive encouragement to Rural Women’s entrepreneurship},
        keywords = {rural Women, entrepreneurship issues, empowerment challenges, sustainability initiatives},
        month = {January},
        }