"Empowerment Entrepreneurship": emancipation through tourism entrepreneurship for women in Nepal

In rural and remote areas of Nepal, women are disregarded, deprived, and subsist in depressed socioeconomic situations. Building on prior research of female entrepreneurs in rural and remote Nepal (Hillman & Radel, 2016; Radel & Hillman, 2016), seven female entrepreneurs from a selection of tourism-related activities were interviewed to recognise the frameworks, styles, stratagems and accomplishment factors of their enterprises in enabling and empowering Nepali women to lift themselves out of poverty through tourism. The proprietors of these all-female led and operated tourism enterprises were invited to narrate their journeys of emancipation and how they went about earning a sustainable income for themselves and their families. The qualitative research was undertaken using a grounded theory approach in order to examine the links between pragmatic, female entrepreneurship, women’s empowerment groups, and women-only training organisations developed specifically to take care of women in Nepal.