Opportunities for enterprise and access to credit are enabling factors for poverty alleviation, especially for communities trapped in cycles of vulnerability. In Arpana’s target area, land, water, and livestock are the main source of livelihood available to poor people. But with continually diminishing outputs and declining farm sizes, it has become more urgent for the rural population to diversify their avenues of income.
Arpana is promoting micro-enterprise programmes through motivating Self Help Group members to take loans from their SHGs for small businesses. As a result, over 1,500 women in Haryana and Himachal Pradesh have taken loans, and are running their small businesses successfully. Most are making incomes far greater than they have ever had before. These include general stores, soap factories, livestock, rice mills, purchase of agricultural equipment, photography, transport, etc. Arpana also organises workshops and in-house training to build women’s capacities for business skills with a view to greater earned incomes.
Arpana