Socio-Economic Impact of Entrepreneurship Activities for the Empowerment of Women in Bangladesh

Abstract

Women empowerment can have a positive effect on a country’s economic development. Entrepreneurship can be a key factor in contributing to the empowerment of women. However, social and cultural norms impact on the extent that women in developing countries engage with and benefit from entrepreneurial activities. This research explored how entrepreneurship increases women empowerment and to understand the socio-economic impact of women entrepreneurship in Bangladesh. The study was conducted with the women of Sylhet district in Bangladesh. Data was collected from a sample of 100 randomly selected women from a population of 280. Empowerment was assessed based on nine factors by using a 5-point rating scale. The overall empowerment score of women was obtained by summing up the scores of the dependent variable. Pearson’s correlation coefficient (r) was computed to explore the relationship between the extents of empowerment of the respondents with their selected characteristics. The findings revealed that the majority (60%) of the rural women had a medium level of empowerment while 31% had low, 6% had very low, and only 3% had a high level of empowerment. Age, education, occupation, communication exposure, access to credit and training received by the respondents were positively correlated with their empowerment. And there is a significant relationship between participation in entrepreneurial activities and women’s empowerment. Also the findings showed that involving entrepreneurship activities have a positive impact on women empowerment.