Unit 2: Gender issues in the world of work

Emerging gender issues in the Asia Pacific region

Rural women workers

An integrated approach to self-employment and entrepreneurship for rural women

An integrated approach to self-employment and entrepreneurship for rural women

Although it is now a well-known fact, it is worth stressing that successful self-employment promotion and small business schemes rely on a number of coherently linked components which provide the following important ingredients (see Good Practice Example):

• Training: It is very imprint that training should be provided in all the different aspects of creating and managing small-scale enterprises, and not just in vocational skills and new technologies. Such training should include confidence building and business skills, such as how to run a business, bookkeeping, pricing, how to obtain formal bank loans, and so on.

• Opportunity identification: There is a difference between having an idea for a business and identifying an opportunity for establishing one. A business idea quite often arises from trying to understand how one can generate income from available skills and resources and, of course, many self-employed women are constrained in this regard. Because of their limited access to information, women often start businesses which are copies of what already exists, and therefore face strong competition. An opportunity is market-based and derives from determining the needs of consumers as potential customers. Systematic opportunity identification surveys should be carried out to identify those businesses and sectors with the greatest growth potential, and to orient potential women entrepreneurs accordingly.

• Business planning, so that women can pursue a real business opportunity and gain access to many of the financing schemes. The business plan allows women to talk to bankers and others in terms which the providers of credit understand. While not assuring them of financing, it is a means by which women have a chance to overcome stereotyped views of their business capabilities. It may also help to boost their self-confidence for embarking on a new business.

• Credit: The availability of financing is commonly highlighted as one of the most critical elements. In view of its significance, credit policy is discussed in greater detail in another section.

• Information, on the legal requirements, administrative regulations, subsidies and other incentives, social security provisions, and other relevant aspects for the creation of small-scale enterprises should regularly reach potential women entrepreneurs.

• Marketing support, in terms of collection and sales centres for products, establishing linkages with larger establishments and exporters, working out subcontracting arrangements as part of production chains, establishing linkages with regular sources of supplies for inputs, arranging exhibitions of the products of self-employed women, and the like. These are some of the measures required to achieve Strategic Objective F.4 of the Beijing Platform to "strengthen women’s economic capacity and commercial networks."

• Counselling, and the provision of ongoing support to the newly self-employed: Women who have just embarked on new businesses may have a better chance of success if they have access to a network of counsellors (who could be program staff or "role models" who have succeeded in business). Such persons could assist them with a range of advice and services, including accounting, payroll preparation and financial mediation services [paragraph 173(e) of the Beijing Platform). The good practice example describes a program to provide such services.

• Supportive legislation and administrative arrangements: Complicated or time-consuming procedures for applying for business licences, business premises, government subsidies or stringent taxation requirements can seriously discourage women from taking up viable self-employment opportunities.

• Group formation: Especially for poorer women who may not initially be able to go into business individually, group formation has proved to be very important. It is a means of organizing women to facilitate access to credit, carrying out production on a larger and more viable basis, improving access to new knowledge, dealing with intermediaries and large buyers, organizing social support services, and arranging delivery of supplies and marketing services.

This does not at all mean that a single agency or institution need be responsible for providing the whole range of complementary interventions required for assisting women to become successful entrepreneurs and to run their own businesses successfully. The "one-stop development agency" may be too overburdened and not able to provide quality services. What is more important is to ensure effective communication and collaboration between governmental and non-governmental agencies or institutions which specialize in particular interventions in order to provide complementary services. These services are them offered as an integrated package to women clients. It is also important that self-employment programs organized by the government or international agencies work closely with local women’s groups which can facilitate access to women participants. It is equally important for women’s groups to recognize and gain access to the commercial expertise of such programs.

[Source: Lin Lean Lim, 1996, More and Better Jobs for Women: an action guide, Geneva: ILO.]

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For further information, please contact the South-East Asia and the Pacific Multidisciplinary
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