New Delhi, 09 February 2022: The project ‘Economic Empowerment of Women Entrepreneurs and Startups by Women (WEE)’ is being implemented by the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship in collaboration with Deutsche Gesellschaftfür Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) Germany on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).
The project aims to pilot incubation and acceleration programmes for women micro entrepreneurs, enabling them to start new businesses and scale up existing enterprises in the States of Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh and 8 North Eastern States of the country.
Under the title of ‘Her&Now’, the project envisages a film and media campaign to tell the stories of successful women entrepreneurs and to foster a positive mindset change on gender roles and expand women entrepreneurship.
The project targets to support 315 aspiring women entrepreneurs, from the selected states, to turn their ideas into a business in the seven-month incubation programme. During the six-month acceleration programme, 130 women with existing businesses were targeted to support to grow their enterprises.
A total of 725 women entrepreneurs have been supported under the project as against the targeted 445 women under both incubation and acceleration support programmes.
Region-wise details of number of women entrepreneurs covered under the incubation and acceleration support programmes in the project, are as follows:
| Region | Total per state |
| NER – 8 states | 233 |
| Rajasthan (9 districts) | 105 |
| Telangana (26 districts) | 109 |
| Maharashtra (3 districts) | 120 |
| Uttar Pradesh (4 districts) | 158 |
| Total | 725 |
This information was given by the Minister of State for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, Shri Rajeev Chandrasekhar in a written reply in the Rajya Sabha today.