K’taka inks MoUs for women-led enterprises

Bengaluru: Karnataka government on Wednesday inked two memoranda of understanding (MoUs) to further strengthen economic activities of women self-help groups and facilitate organic farmers to sell their produce directly to consumers.

Out of the two MoUs, one was with IIM-B, a business school to help women self-help groups, and the other with Subhiksha, a vertically integrated multi-state co-operative society which promotes organic farming.

The MoUs were exchanged in the presence of Minister for Livelihood C N Ashwath Narayan. On behalf of the government, Sanjeevini – Karnataka State Rural Livelihood Promotion Society (KSRLPS) and National Rural Economic Transformation Programme (NRETP), exchanged MoUs with the institutions, a release from his office said.

Narayan said IIM-B Incubator for women SHGs would be a platform that helps women entrepreneurs get access to resources. It would enable them to scale up existing womenowned/ women-led growthoriented enterprises, he said.

The intended incubator would focus on supporting rural home-grown entrepreneurs, especially women, who face additional constraints in accessing such services, he said. The aim of the initiative is to scale up at least 100-150 existing womenowned/ women-led growthoriented enterprises in the State.

Further, it is expected that the MoU would facilitate creating business models for generating local employment, improving the creditworthiness of enterprises, enabling access for credit from formal financial institutions, and capacitating women entrepreneurs to run businesses themselves.