Women's eco-entrepreneurship: a possible pathway towards community resilience?

Abstract

The growing emergence of new enterprises led by women in rural areas can be seen as a sign of the adaptive capacity at a personal and household level as a response to financial crisis effects. This study uses quantitative and qualitative methods to explore the elements that go along with this new entrepreneurship looking at its consistency with local rural development and gender policies in the mountainous region of the High Catalan Pyrenees (HCP) in Spain. Results indicate that women’s new entrepreneurship shows several elements which can be associated with a strong social resilience in the HCP. However, there is a neglected situation regarding the specific territorial needs as a mountainous area. In addition, the lack of a top priority commitment being given to gender policies at regional level leads to a failure to eliminate gender divisions, which, in turn, results in a reduction in the transformative power of women’s livelihood strategies. Conclusions highlight an existing gap between local rural development policies and gender policies in the region which demonstrates the need for a continued commitment to a practical application of a transversal approach in the local rural development projects in the region.