Skill upgradation and Mahila Coir Yojana envisages provision for training to women artisans by providing self employment opportunities to them

New Delhi : Ministry through Coir Board, a statutory body is implementing various skill development activities across the country under the component ‘Skill Upgradation & Mahila Coir Yojana’ of Coir Vikas Yojana, a Central Sector Scheme. Among the various skill development programmes under Coir Vikas Yojana, the Scheme Mahila Coir Yojana (MCY) envisages provision for training only to women artisans.

MCY is being implemented by the Coir Board for the empowerment of women artisans in the coir sector with an aim to provide self employment opportunities to rural women artisans in regions processing coconut husk and provides scope for large scale employment as well as improvement of standard of living of rural women artisans. The main objectives of the scheme are as under:

• To train the personnel artisans in the cadres of Supervisors/ Instructors/ Artisans and to meet the requirement of skilled man power for the development of coir industry.
• Help in transfer of technology to non-traditional areas through development of skill of coir workers.
• Assisting the MCY trained women artisans for procuring spinning equipments/coir processing machineries from the PMEGP.
• To inculcate quality consciousness among workers at grass root level and to educate them on proper methods of producing standard quality fibre, yarn and products.

The present implementation status of the Scheme MCY in the Country, State/UT wise are as under:

In the FY 2022-23, around 33 nos. of woman artisans who were trained under MCY got employment in units.

During FY- 2022-23 , 740 nos. of women trained under MCY in the Country. The details of number of women trained in the State of Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra along with the amount of stipend paid are as under :

During the current year 2022-23, an amount of Rs.234 lakhs has been allocated for MCY.  At present, there are 740 nos. of women beneficiaries in the Country and an amount of Rs.92.96 lakhs released for this Yojana so far for the current year.

The details of number of women beneficiaries under MCY in the State of Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra along with the financial utilization made for this Yojana are as under:

(Rs. in Lakhs)

State	Financial allocation (as on 19.12.2022)	Fund Released so far (as on 19.12.2022)
Tamil Nadu	31.2	13.28
Maharashra	46.8	16.60

The Coir Board has done an evaluation study during the year 2020. In the study, it is found that income of rural women has been increased significantly after getting training under MCY. The production of coir has increased and enabled the women spinners to earn a higher income.

Apart from Mahila Coir Yojana, Coir Board is also implementing various skill development activities under Coir VikasYojana, across the country like Training in Value Added Products, regular training Courses, Awareness Programme, etc. for making the  rural women artisans/ unskilled labourers  aware  of the working of coir units and improving their skills and thereby motivating them for setting up of their own coir units or coir based industries by availing the assistance under the Scheme PMEGP. With a view to disseminate information on the schemes and latest technologies available in coir sector,  the Board also organizes Entrepreneurship Development Programmes, Workshops, Exposure Tour etc. under this Scheme. All these programmes help to get more participation of artisans including women artisan to the industry.

This information was given by Union Minister of State for MSME Shri Bhanu Pratap Singh Verma in a written reply in Lok Sabha today.