FICCI Ladies Organisation signs MoU with social enterprise Women on Wings

NEW DELHI: FICCI Ladies Organization (FLO) and Women on Wings have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to collaborate for sustainable livelihoods and economic empowerment of women in rural areas.

The partnership will focus on identifying and supporting social enterprises working primarily with rural women in sectors such as agriculture, food processing, eco-tourism, textiles, handicrafts, waste management and non-timber forest products (NTFP) and related upstream activities and NTFP, according to a release. The goal of this support is to increase livelihood opportunities and growth of women artisans engaged with the selected organizations.

The partnership between FICCI FLO and Women on Wings (whose goal is to create jobs in rural India) will also play a critical role amidst the social and economic unrest brought by Covid-19. In view of a big migrant population moving back to their small towns and villages, the partnership is an effort to address the unique challenge of creating more employment opportunities in rural India.

On signing the MoU Jahnabi Phookan, national president, FICCI FLO said “I am excited to take the vision of FICCI FLO forward by promoting entrepreneurship and professional excellence among women. Women on Wings wonderfully matches our mission in the current challenging times and I look forward to partner with them.”

Ronald van het Hof, joint managing director at Women on Wings said: “FICCI FLO and Women on Wings share a common vision of promoting grassroots enterprises and helping the women workers therein become economically independent. We are now joining hands in our effort to empower one million women in rural India.”

FICCI Ladies Organization is a subsidiary of FICCI and as the name suggests, focuses on women entrepreneurs in specific. FLO’s role as the Women’s’ Chamber of Commerce, is to connect the dots between Women on Wings and the social entrepreneurs through its bandwidth of 17 FLO chapters Pan India. This is in sync with FLO’s mission to work towards sustainable livelihood for women’s economic empowerment. Through these 17 chapters, FLO represents 8,000 female entrepreneurs and professionals.