Women Participation in MSMEs

With limited data and information, this paper aims to examine the recent developments in women participation/entrepreneurs in India.. This paper focuses on women entrepreneurs in micro, small and medium enterprises. The objective of the paper is: a) to estimate the ratio of women labor force in micro, small and medium enterprises, b) women share in registered and unregistered MSMEs, c) to identify the socioeconomic problems faced by women, d) credit availability, e) development of women entrepreneurship under planning. The findings of the paper shows that women form a category of “forced” entrepreneurs seeking to supplement their family incomes. A larger share of the women workforce belongs to the poor families or lower middle income group. Our findings also comes up with the fact that even after six decades of independence, women participation is just 10-13% of the in micro, small and medium enterprises. The recent trends show that when women are better educated and have better paid employment opportunities, then participation of women might decline in SMEs and they may move towards large scale industries.