Tlthough today many women in Bangladesh are running various businesses, entrepreneurship in the country, in reality, is still a male subject. Forget about big business establishments; even in the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) sector, male entrepreneurs dominate.

The steady increase in the number of women entrepreneurs in the SME sector, however, is an encouraging sign, thinks Nasreen Awal Mintoo, President of Women Entrepreneurs Association of Bangladesh (WEAB). According to her, a decade ago, women in the country were confronted with more hurdles but now there is more social acceptance and more women are encouraged to take up business initiatives. A number of organizations, such as hers, DCC (Dhaka Chamber of Commerce) and a few foreign donor agencies are actively promoting women entrepreneurship. WEAB, in particular, has organized various trainings and fairs for their members. Some of the fairs were held outside Bangladesh to give Bangladeshi women entrepreneurs the opportunity to expose their work internationally. The media, Nasreen says, has played an important role, especially in the context of doing away with social dogmas.

WEAB president admits participating in an international fair does not necessarily guarantee export, but to her, even one export order in the whole fair counts, as it builds confidence and gives a sense of inspiration to other women participants to try to improve their products and marketing skills.

Still more needs to be done, and WEAB is at it, says Nasreen. One major challenge is funding options are limited for women entrepreneurs.

There are a few organizations that provide credits mostly in the range from 50,000 taka to 500,000 taka for SME, but the funding is limited and the interest rate is often 15% or higher. Many prospective women entrepreneurs do not feel secured taking such interest burden at the early stages of their...