Google on Monday announced its commitment to help one million women in rural villages in India to become entrepreneurs through business tutorials, tools, and mentoring.

This was announced alongside a series of new initiatives by Google to support the economic empowerment of women at a virtual edition of Google for India event called ‘Women Will’ on the occasion of International Women’s Day.

The event also marked the completion of the Internet Saathi programme, a joint effort by Google with Tata Trusts. The programme was launched in 2015 by Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai. It was designed to impart digital literacy training to women across 300,000 villages in India. Over six years, the pan-India initiative has reached out to over 30 million women across India through training provided by over 80,000 ‘Internet Saathis.’

Internet Saathis (friends) are trained in digital literacy so that they can in turn train other women.

Also read: Google partners with Sheroes to scale accelerator program for rural women entrepreneurs

“We look upon the success of the Internet Saathis partnership we have had with Google with great satisfaction. Together, we embarked on training women trainers to familiarise other women on how to utilise the internet, all in the rural environment, that would otherwise never take place. In bringing today’s technology, and perhaps tomorrow’s technology, to bear for the benefit of rural women is a great move forward. Over time, these efforts will ensure that the true value of the internet can come to the fore,” said Ratan Tata, Chairman, Tata Trust talking about the Trusts’ partnership with Google.

“Empowering women entrepreneurs could create hundreds of millions of jobs and help more people benefit from India’s growing digital economy,” said Pichai.

Also read: Google’s Internet Sathi trains 1.5 crore women

Union Minister Smriti Zubin Irani, Minister of Women and Child Development, Government of India, in a special address during the event, said, “The time now, especially with such great leaps in technology, is ripe for India and other emerging economies to ensure that a level playing field is created for the economic advancement of women. I am happy to learn about Google’s efforts and commitment to enable women entrepreneurs in India as these will create pathways for the socio-economic advancement of women.”

The Women Will platform

The tech giant has now announced its efforts to enable one million more women in India.

“When women have equal access to opportunity, we all benefit from their perspectives, creativity and their expertise, and this is true all over the world. Yet, when it comes to accessing opportunity, deep inequalities persist. Building on the Internet Saathi programme success, we’re making a new commitment to help 1 million women in rural villages in India to become entrepreneurs through business tutorials, tools, and mentorship.”

Google is introducing a new Women Will web platform to support women in rural India. The platform will be complemented by community support, mentorship, and accelerator programmes for rural women entrepreneurs. It is being launched in English and Hindi with more languages to come and is designed especially for women aspiring to explore entrepreneurship.

“Through a “how-to” curriculum on turning an interest into a business, managing an enterprise, and promoting it for growth, the platform will provide guidance and support to women who want to convert an existing hobby or talent such as tailoring, beauty services, home tuition, food processing, etc. into some income,” Google explained in a blog post.

The tech major will be working with 2,000 Internet Saathis to help other women gain from this resource.

Work with Nasscom Foundation

Google will also be committing $500,000 in funding to Nasscom Foundation through its philanthropic arm, Google.org to provide women with access to relevant skills.

Nasscom Foundation will reach 100,000 women farmers with digital and financial literacy training in the six states of Bihar, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, and Uttar Pradesh. Nasscom Foundation will also set up a helpline where women agri workers will be able to call and get further counselling on their entrepreneurship related queries.

Global Google.org Impact Challenge

Pichai also announced a global Google.org Impact Challenge for Women and Girls. As part of the initiative launched by Google’s philanthropy arm Google.org, it will provide $25 million in grants to nonprofits and social enterprises in India and around the world working to help women “address systemic barriers to economic equality, pursue entrepreneurship, build financial independence, and more.” Selected Impact Challenge grantees will also receive mentoring from Googlers, Ad Grants, and additional support.

“Women are almost twice as likely to lose their jobs during the pandemic and an estimated 20 million girls are at risk of not returning to school. We have the opportunity to build a future that is more equal and more inclusive—and we must take it,” Pichai said.

The initiative calls for ideas from nonprofits and social organisations around the world that are working to advance the economic empowerment of women and girls.

A panel of experts comprising of women leaders from more than 15 countries with deep expertise in global public policy, advocacy, research, business, technology and more will help guide Google in the initiative and in selecting the ideas with the greatest potential.

Organisations have until Friday, April 9 to submit ideas, and grant recipients will be announced later this year.

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