Women s involvement in non farm businesses aspirations drivers and constraints

Abstract

The study attempts to examine women s involvement in non-farm businesses with newlinerespect to their business participation and business decision making. In recent years, an newlineincrease in women s non-farm self-employment has been observed. There has been a 10- newlinepercentage point increase in rural women s non-farm self-employment across the newlinemanufacturing sector (from 71.7 to 81.8 percent) and a 6% point in the service sector (from 23.1 to 29.1 percent) between 2017-18 and 2022-23 (Deshpande, 2023).Therefore, this study aims to trace various contextual factors, the role of various forms of Capital, and gender norms which either facilitate or impede women to engage in non-farm businesses. The study also explores how women exercise their agency and negotiate through various constraints to establish their presence in these informal businesses. The outcomes of such negotiation in terms of improving their role in the business has also been explored. Since much of these enterprises are operating as informal household enterprises, with intersecting spaces of business and family sphere, traditional gender norms and gender normative roles continue to exist. Women in these businesses have to bargain and negotiate in order to overcome the patriarchal structures of constraints. However, these decisions are not made independently but rather interdependently with other members involved in the business whose influence may be positive or negative. Therefore, the study also explores the processes by which women negotiate in the business sphere by employing different forms of capital. We explore newlinewhether push factors operate in influencing women s involvement in business such as the newlineeconomic condition of the household and the educational level of the women. A sequential newlineresearch design comprising of quantitative and qualitative phase of data analysis has been undertaken. The quantitative phase uses the IHDS data to understand the determinants of women s non-farm business participation, the specific role they assume in the business.