Women in rural regions possess immense entrepreneurial potential and, with the right support, can drive transformative change. Access to finance, technology, and skill development, including financial and digital literacy, is essential for enabling women to manage and scale enterprises. However, creating sustainable enterprises in rural settings is a complex challenge, especially for women, where small landholdings and fragmented agriculture limit income growth.

To address this, Reliance Foundation and Gates Foundation launched the Swayamshree programme, aiming to empower one million women in Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, and Odisha. In Madhya Pradesh, the programme seeks to impact 4,00,000 women, in collaboration with the MPSRLM and supported by organisations PRADAN and SRIJAN. By engaging women in farm, off-farm, and non-farm income-generating activities, Swayamshree helps raise annual incomes while strengthening women’s collectives, testing and scaling innovations, and creating replicable models of entrepreneurship.

This compendium, Swayamshree Insights, captures the journey of learning, adaptation, and innovation. It highlights best practices across 12 value chains including mustard oil processing, honey collection, sericulture, backyard poultry, and protected cultivation, while showcasing how community ownership, institutional collaboration, and women’s leadership can transform livelihoods and advance gender equality.