Micro Entrepreneurship in Rural INDIA

 
 
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Abstract
For a living, most of the rural people in developing countries are primarily dependent on
agriculture. If the farmers, who have investible surplus generated from agriculture, are interested
in non-farm entrepreneurship then rural economy can find an industrial route of development.
With this consideration, the study has posed the research question as to what determines nonfarm entrepreneurship among farmers and thus attempted to identify the factors that may
influence farmer’s non-farm entrepreneurship. So far as the investigation part of the study is
concerned Bardhaman district of the state of West Bengal in India was selected because during
1980s and 1990s the state has experienced high agricultural growth compared to the previous
decades, which implies that farmers might have been able to gather surplus generated from
agricultural development and therefore it was considered interesting to study non-farm
entrepreneurship of farmers of West Bengal.
 
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Content
DEDICATION..................................................................................................................................................2
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS...................................................................................................................................3
DECLARATION ...............................................................................................................................................4
Abstract.........................................................................................................................................................5
Chapter 1.......................................................................................................................................................9
1.1 Introduction.........................................................................................................................................9
1.2 Aim ...................................................................................................................................................10
1.3 Purpose and research goals............................................................................................................... 11
1.4 Research Question ............................................................................................................................ 11
1.5 Significance of the Study .................................................................................................................. 12
1.6 Background.......................................................................................................................................12
Chapter 2 Study Area ..................................................................................................................................14
2.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................................................14
2.2 Bengal in Retrospect......................................................................................................................... 15
2.3 A Brief History of Bengali Entrepreneurship ................................................................................... 16
2.4 Agriculture in West Bengal............................................................................................................... 17
2.5 The growth debate............................................................................................................................. 18
2.6 Industry in West Bengal.................................................................................................................... 19
2.7 Urbanisation and infrastructure in West Bengal ............................................................................... 20
2.8 Urban Centres and Small-Scale Industries in West Bengal.............................................................. 22
2.9 Rural Industrialisation and the Role of Infrastructure in Rural Towns............................................. 23
2.10 Bardhaman’s economy in retrospect: A glimpse ............................................................................ 24
2.11 Recent Bardhaman: A glimpse ....................................................................................................... 24
Chapter 3 Literature review........................................................................................................................ 26
3.1 Poverty in India (with special reference to rural poverty) ................................................................ 26
3.2 Rural Poverty in West Bengal........................................................................................................... 27
3.3 Entrepreneurship ............................................................................................................................... 28
3.4 Agr