Daijiworld Media Network - New Delhi
New Delhi, Aug 22: The Centre on Friday launched the second phase of its national entrepreneurship campaign under the rural livelihoods mission, with a focus on converting more livelihood activities undertaken by self-help group (SHG) women into sustainable enterprises and accelerating progress towards the target of creating six crore ‘Lakhpati Didis’.
The three-month ‘National Campaign on Entrepreneurship-II’ was launched by Rural Development Secretary Rohit Kansal on World Entrepreneurs Day. The campaign will run from August 21 to November 21 and focus on both farm and non-farm enterprises, formalisation of businesses and marketing of products made by SHG members.
The second phase builds on the experience of the first campaign, with greater emphasis on enterprise handholding, strengthening producer institutions and simplifying implementation processes.
Under the campaign, the government has set a target of providing entrepreneurship and livelihood training to five lakh SHG women and supporting the formalisation of 50,000 enterprises.
The initiative will also seek to orient 50,000 community cadres, strengthen producer groups and producer enterprises by adding two lakh members, promote agro-ecological practices among 20 lakh women and onboard 25,000 SHG members on e-commerce platforms.
Digital commerce will be promoted through platforms such as the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) and Government e-Marketplace (GeM). The campaign will also facilitate buyer-seller meets and establish linkages with buyers, aggregators, retailers and institutional purchasers.
Community Resource Persons for enterprise promotion and Business Development Service Providers will be recognised as ‘Udyam Sakhis’ under the campaign. The move is aimed at giving greater visibility to community cadres working to promote rural enterprises.
States will conduct entrepreneurship development training, exposure visits and programmes covering business planning, financial literacy, product development, branding and digital marketing.
Kansal also released the first edition of ‘Sankalp Shakti’, a monthly rural enterprise technical bulletin under the Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana-National Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM).
The bulletin will focus on issues related to the empowerment and enterprise development of ‘Lakhpati Didis’.
The Ministry of Rural Development said the campaign would seek to strengthen the farm and non-farm livelihood architecture by converting viable livelihood activities into women-led enterprises, rather than treating farm livelihoods merely as training interventions.
The launch event was attended by the secretaries and principal secretaries of rural development departments of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, West Bengal and Goa. State mission directors and CEOs of 34 State Rural Livelihoods Missions also participated virtually.