Abstract:
Bangladesh is a developing nation rich in human resources where women constitute
slightly less than half the population. They provide an essential opportunity for economic
and social development and progress. Women's participation in any kind of economic
activity is of a complementary nature to their family incomes; their participation in no
way reduces their family duties. Women's equal rights are now defined by women's
economic empowerment and the ultimate empowerment is through entrepreneurship. The
overall objective of the present study was to assess the women's economic contribution
and their participation for enhancing the empowerment in livelihood activities. Dhaka
city was selected as the area and the data were collected from 105 women entrepreneurs
classifying into three groups namely: boutique and handicrafts, foods and catering and
beauty parlor of the Dhaka city. It was found that mostly the educated, middle-aged
women with some sort of professional training were mainly involved with entrepreneurial
activities. The freedom of decision making in the important spheres of their lives is the
leading influencing factors. Since getting the self-respect is the every woman's urged
need, they involved in the economic activities like entrepreneurship. Craving for
economic independency is another influencing factor. There are some demographic
characteristics that influence women to be entrepreneurs among them the education,
spouse's education, spouse's occupation etc. The average empowerment of the women
entrepreneurs was found 4.30 on a scale of 5 with the help of women empowerment
index. It was found that entrepreneurship of the boutique and handicrafts was more
profitable than the Food and catering services and beauty parlor by using Logit model. So
the study concluded that increased facilities of women education are very much essential
for new entrepreneurship. Various types of professional training on skill development of
the women entrepreneurs are needed to reach at the very grass-root levels. Moreover the
traditional outlook of the people of the society must be changed otherwise every attempts
will be in vain.
