Micro-Women Entrepreneurship and its potential for hospitality and tourism related enterprises amongst others: a study on YSR District, Andhra Pradesh, India

The position of women and their status in any society is an index of its level of civilization. Women are to be considered as equal partners in the process of development. But, because of centuries of exploitation and subjugation, Indian women have remained at the receiving end. Women in India have been neglected a great deal. The rate of growth of women employment in India is very low when compared to developed nations. This is because of the low growth rate of new and productive employment. There is a scheme which women can access with less effort than the traditional routes to business development in areas such as food production and even hospitality and tourism, and this is the Self Help Group (SHG) which is categorized as micro finance. It is a tool to eradicate poverty and improve entrepreneurship and financial support for women in India. An SHG is a small economically homogeneous affinity group of the rural poor which voluntarily comes together to save small amounts of money but on a regular basis. SHGs enhance the equality and status of women as participants, decision-makers and beneficiaries in the democratic, economic, social and cultural spheres of life. The article focuses on SHG formation, women entrepreneurship and economic empowerment of women after they have joined SHGs in YSR district, A.P. India. YSR district (Kadapa district) is one of the pioneering districts for the implementation of the SHG programme as a pilot project in the Andhra Pradesh state. At the present time there are 21 Mandals in YSR district of Andhra Pradesh which consist of a total of 35,338 SHGs. Of these, the best two mandals, namely, Kodur and Ramapuram were selected for this study because of the SHGs in these mandals which are operating very successfully. This success is based on age, education, income level, nature of family, size of the family, reasons for joining SHGs and the amount of loan availed of by the selected women entrepreneurs. There are 19087 members from 1567 SHGs in select mandals in YSR district. From these, 100 respondents were selected for the study representing 50 members from each mandal. The selection was made based on a convenient sampling method.