Yet to cross a long distance

Bangladesh women's entrepreneurial zeal is widely appreciated around the world. They have proved to be good microcredit borrowers, even compared to their male counterparts. In Bangladesh, women are also the main drivers of the growth of small and medium-sized businesses in the country.
There are more than 12 chambers formed and run by women and many more associations are working for development of the women entrepreneurship in Bangladesh. Some of the businesswomen, too, have come of age after joining business when only a few women were engaged in large business.
However, despite relentless efforts by both public and private sectors, the ratio of drop-out of start-up women entrepreneurs is still high. Women start business with much enthusiasm but many of them could not continue for different social and economic barriers. There is no study as well on how many of the start-up women entrepreneurs drop out before turning into a mid-level business.
People associated with development of women entrepreneurship said almost 50 per cent of the women entrepreneurs quit business at the entry level. Unfortunately ratio of success of women in business is still not at the expected level although the process of women empowerment started many years ago.
It has been found that women having good connections and family background in business have become more successful in doing business. Also, women leaders said, knowledge base, educational qualification and financial capacity of the women are major factors behind success of women in business.
Selima Ahmad, president of Bangladesh Women Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BWCCI), said many of the women start businesses for financial needs without, what she listed as, technical knowledge, business plan, accounting sense, market survey, computer skills, e-commerce and so on.
"An entrepreneur needs to know his/her customer. Women entrepreneurs drop out from business due to lack of proper preparation before starting business," she said.
Although failure can be a learning process, women entrepreneurs in Bangladesh hardly stand up again due to economic insolvency and lack of confidence and support from the society, she said.
Her trade body, BWCCI, has planned to launch a residential training programme for new women entrepreneurs by building a hostel in Gazipur.
The woman entrepreneur also feels that it is responsibility of the society and the state to build capacity of start-up women entrepreneurs.
"Drop out of women in business has a huge impact on the economy and affect empowerment of women," she said. Ms Ahmad, however, pointed out that the ratio of drop out of women entrepreneurs from businesses is coming down day by day as they learned how to build business networking.
Rokia Afzal Rahman, president of Bangladesh Federation of Women Entrepreneurs (BFWE), said women are doing business in small scale but yet to emerge as large businesswomen.
"Absence of technological advancement and high prices of land may be the reasons behind this (lagging)," she added.
Although the Bangladesh Bank (BB) has made special provision for providing loan facilities to the women entrepreneurs, many of them are afraid of risks of taking challenge of starting a big business, she said.
"Maybe, women are happy with the small return in business. They are doing good in micro-level businesses and SMEs (small and medium enterprises)," Ms Rahman said.
Farhana Lucky, a businesswoman running an advertising firm, said, "Bank interest rate against loan made me scared, it's hard to think of taking a big loan for my business."
Also, complexities in payment of value added tax (VAT) and income tax are another reason that makes many women shy away from starting a big business.
"We rather prefer doing business in small scale to avoid such hassle," she added.
The family and social environment of Bangladesh is yet to be fully supportive of women and encourage them to start a big business, she added.
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