Impacts of m icro c redits on e conomic e mpowerment of Iranian r ural w omen h ead of h ouseholds : A c ase s tudy of h azrat Zeinab Kobra p rogramme in Boueen Zahra v illages

        Empowerment of rural women is one of the most important issues in development. The increasing rate of rural mens’ migration to cities and industrialized centres necessitates the participation of women in economic practices. However, there are women, which in comparison with other women have limited endowments, because they lost the support and contributions of their husbands due to death, sickness, drug addiction or imprisonment. Empowerment is one of the main mechanisms to alleviate poverty among rural women. Women empowerment is often planned through microfinance projects which direct women to productive and income generating activities. There are different approaches to the extension of micro credits to rural areas with the intension to empower women, these can be classified according to their main orientations, ie market, state and community. The Agricultural Bank of Iran has designed and implemented a micro credit program for rural women head osf households. This article examines the impacts of micro credit dibursed by the bank on empowerment of rural women active in livestock sector in villages of Boueen z ahra covered by this program, some recommendations are also proposed to improve the performance.