MICROFINANCE : A STUDY ON PROBLEMS AND CHALLENGES AMONG RURAL WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS

In 1990's microfinance is began to develop as an industry and in the 2000s is main objective is to satisfy the unmet demands on a much larger scale and to play a role in reducing poverty. Rural women in India is quite aware of the fact that they could either earn income or save household expenditure in one way or other. Rural women is quite interested to contribute to the household economy by sharing some of the household expenditures, to give better education to their children, for better health facilities, better living standards etc., The present study is aimed to study the demographic characteristics of rural women and to study the problems and challenges that rural women are facing. Data was collected from a sample of 450 by using structured questionnaire and data was analysed by using Garette ranking method. After analyzing the data, it was found that the problem of lack of awareness on government schemes is with a highest mean value of 4.2978 and the problem balancing of business and personal life is with the lowest value of 3.6044. It is suggested to conduct awareness and training programmes to rural women to realize dreams of becoming economically independent.