News Round-Up about Women Empowerment Some news about women empowerment

International Women's Day stands for the spirit in everyone's heart that wants to live with equality in the society. Every small step counts and should be celebrated.

In the same spirit, we bring to you a roundup of news from the last week about women empowerment and what measures have been taken to ensure change happens.

Indian Government launches 'E-haat' to promote women entrepreneurs

Government of India has launched an online platform by the name "Mahila E-Haat' to promote women entrepreneurs. This online from Women and Child Development Ministry is a first-of-its-kind website that seeks to encourage women, particularly from rural background, to sell their products online. They can sell their products directly without having to bear any cost.

"It is generally not possible for rural women to go to far-off places to sell products made by them. Therefore, we decided to help them in selling their products. The product can include clothing, organic products or toys. The website is completely new and is being done for the first time by any ministry," Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi said at the launch on the eve of International Women's Day.

For registering on the website, the women entrepreneurs will have to submit information online or by email/letter in the required format. The moderators will then select the products to be displayed and inform vendors. The sellers can also do the pricing of the products using their own discretion.

"Currently women have to go through a lot of intermediaries. Through this initiative, a major portion of the profit will go to them directly which will boost their confidence," WCD Secretary V Somasundaram said.

ICICI announces initiative iWork@home for women staff

Multitasking comes easy to women and then it becomes a habit. But when responsibilities increase with age, it gets harder coping up with the work and life at home. This is one main reason why many women stop working after having kids.

Keeping this in mind, on Monday, ICICI announced its new initiative by the name "iWork@home. Developed by the bank in partnership with students of IIT Delhi, this technology will enable women employees to work from home for an extended period of time depending on their needs.

Employees will be provided access to their required operating system in a safe and secure manner to create a seamless office-like environment, initially for a period of up to one year. The technology platform has been developed by ICICI Bank in partnership with students of IIT Delhi.

"We wanted to create a stronger support system for women to ensure that they do not leave the workforce at key life stages. We decided to use technology to make life simpler for women managers," said Chanda Kochhar, MD at ICICI Bank.

Besides, the bank will now provide women managers with children up to three years of age the cost of travel and stay of the child, and caregiver. "This will help our young managers focus on their work without emotional stress of staying away from their children," said Kochhar. Experts welcomed the bank's move. (ET)

"ICICI's leadership in the space of gender parity speaks loud and clear with the number of women leaders the bank has sent out to the world," said Saundarya Rajesh, founder of Avtar Career Creators & FLEXI Careers India.

Snapdeal and FLO join in to initiate "Women Entrepreneurship (WE) in e-commerce"

Online marketplace Snapdeal and FICCI Ladies Organization (FLO) have signed an agreement to launch the "Women Entrepreneurship (WE) in e-commerce" initiative, a statement said on Monday.

"India is the fastest growing e-commerce market in the region and we need to further encourage women to foray into this area. This initiative will facilitate the process of women empowerment by providing them a digital platform to promote their businesses," said Ficci secretary general, A Didar Singh.

The MoU, signed ahead of the International Women's Day (on March 8), will enable Snapdeal and FLO to work together to educate, enable and empower women entrepreneurs to leverage digital commerce to grow their businesses, the statement said.

"Through this initiative, Snapdeal and Ficci FLO will enable digital inclusion for 4,000 women entrepreneurs and artisans, affiliated to FICCI FLO chapters across 15 locations in India," it said. (ET)

For full coverage of International Women's Day 2016 click here (https://www.entrepreneur.com/topic/women-entrepreneurs)