ME-2018 Collectives and Producer Companies

Kudumbashree was working to strengthen the livelihood and economic empowerment of women since Inception. Economic empowerment and poverty alleviation are crucial for the empowerment of Women. In order to help women in its network to increase income, Kudumbashree has focused on Micro Enterprises. Later in 2007 the concept of Samagra was introduced with the objective of achieving scale in enterprise activities, bringing more technical facilitation based on local resources, convergence of funds and functions, more women are oriented towards taking up these value chain projects. Similar enterprises have similar needs and similar problems. In 2011 the micro enterprises are encouraged to form Consortiums under Charitable Societies Act. At this juncture Nutrimix, IT, and Cashew entrepreneurs formed collectives in the form of Societies. The concept of Collective was introduced in order to bring more attention to formation of collective and bringing sustainability to the enterprises. The approach under collectives is to capacitate the entrepreneurs to take up sustainable livelihoods under their leadership. Members in Farm activities are encouraged to form Producer Companies and Enterprises in Non farm sector are facilitated to form Consortiums.