Women in business...in the countryside

Women in rural areas who run their own businesses are helping drive up the number of female entrepreneurs in the UK, according to DTI's Equality Minister Jacqui Smith.

Recent research from the Global Enterprise Monitor shows that there is higher entrepreneurial activity by women in rural areas than in either urban or suburban areas. Such increases, it is claimed, are due to a variety of factors including greater freedom to combine paid work and other commitments and the challenge of working for themselves.

Speaking to the Women in Enterprise Conference in Shropshire, Women and Equality Minister Jacqui Smith said: "Self employment is an increasingly important way for women to participate in the rural economy and more women are self employed in rural areas than in towns and cities.

"Although women represent the largest under-represented group in terms of participation in enterprise, there is still a vast source of untapped potential. If women started businesses at the same rate as men we would have 150,000 extra start ups in the UK.

"The rural female entrepreneurs at today's conference are the role models for the entrepreneurs of the future. They're making their mark helping generate between £50 and £70 billion a year for the UK economy."

Women in Rural Enterprise have identified some of the main barriers to rural women setting up their own businesses including:

• lack of access to finance
  
• lack of confidence
  
• not being taken seriously
  
• rural isolation.

Figures from the Small Business Service Annual Small Business Survey and ONS Annual Business Inquiry suggest there are over 600,000 women owned businesses in the UK generating between £50 and £70 billion for the UK economy.