“There hasn’t been a better time to be a woman entrepreneur”, said Ekta Jaju, Founder of ONganic in one of the conversations we had with her last year. This stuck with me. And it’s absolutely true, but I only partly agree.
In the last few years, there has been an increasing number of women entrepreneurs across sectors. We have examples of stellar women entrepreneurs – from Nykaa’s Falguni Nayar, who recently raised an IPO, to examples closer to home, such as Ekta, a social entrepreneur creating an organic farming movement in the agribusiness sector. We’ve also seen Entrepreneur Support Organizations focus more on promoting and supporting women entrepreneurs and a lot of conversations and commitment by investors under the theme of Gender Lens Investing.
But does this mean all barriers and gender-based biases have been broken? Does this mean that we’re actually doing better? We've come a really long way, but we have more work to do.
According to a Google and Bain & Co report, there are 13.5-15.7 million women-owned businesses in India. While this represents only 20% of all enterprises, they provide employment to 22-27 million people. The report states that by accelerating the quantity and quality of women-owned businesses to 30 million, it could lead to the creation of 150-170 million jobs, which is more than 25% of the new jobs required for the entire working age population, from now until 2030.
This clearly shows that inclusion of women in entrepreneurship has a tremendous impact on employment and job creation, bringing households out of poverty and overall economic growth.
The research is quite clear. So what’s the problem?
We still live in a world where gender-based biases exist. They are deep-rooted, layered and unconscious; and are not necessarily as tangible as data on access to finance or pay disparities. In her book, Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men, Caroline Criado-Perez talks about the ‘male default’ and how so much of the way the world operates is based on this. She makes a case for how women have been excluded from this design – from infrastructure to everyday products, and how it negatively impacts the lives of women and, by extension, families and households.
These biases also play out as women entrepreneurs build and grow their businesses. Last year, ANDE India held an action lab as part of their Gender Equality Initiative. The group aimed to identify unique challenges women entrepreneurs face, like access to funding and networking. They also uncovered underlying biases in how women entrepreneurs are perceived by investors, and in how entrepreneurial support is structured more towards men.
While there is tangible data on gender pay inequalities and equity financing gaps, I specifically highlight the angle of gender biases because this isn’t just based on socio, economic and cultural contexts, but it is systemic. And it therefore plays into how we as investors should make decisions. Until we acknowledge how we have been operating so far, we cannot move towards a world which is inclusive. Until we acknowledge this, we cannot take proactive measures to #BreaktheBias.
Upaya’s commitment to supporting women led businesses
At Upaya, we have been gender conscious when it comes to supporting and investing in women entrepreneurs. Our mission is to create dignified jobs to bring people out of extreme poverty. We believe that women entrepreneurs play a critical role in enabling livelihoods for women jobholders, who in turn support their households in the path to overcoming the extreme poverty cycle.
In 2021, we ran our accelerator program focused on women-led businesses. This year we are committing 60% of our new investments in women-led businesses.
As we contribute to an ecosystem and network that supports women-led businesses, Upaya has also been conscious about our internal structures. 75% of Upaya’s management team comprises women leaders, 66% of our Board of Directors are women and 70% of our Investment Committee members are women.
Have we started doing our part to #BreaktheBias? I think so.
