Ms. Laxmi Khanal lived in India for about 12 years, where her husband was a government employee. She stayed at home and took care of her children. But when she returned back to Nepal with her family, she wanted to do something on her own. However, Laxmi did not have any knowledge about other vocations nor was she literate to apply for a proper job. So, she thought of cattle rearing, which would definitely be easier, as it was a skill passed down from generation to generation and this was something familiar to her from a young age.

She started with just one cow and registered her business only she could build a proper shed and bring in more cows to the farm. She shared, “We started first selling milk at NPR. 10 per liter and highest price that we have sold cow milk is at NPR. 70 per liter.” Her husband used to carry the milk in his bicycle and deliver from house to house.

Initially people did not believe in her business acumen to lend her money to invest in the business. Once the farm started, she had to bear huge loss because the cows died due to various diseases. But she did not give up and persistently kept working hard to sustain her business. “I feel very overwhelmed after becoming an entrepreneur. The people in the society today recognize me as Gai wala Laxmi (cow owner Laxmi)”, she shared proudly and added, “People may not know me by my name but they definitely know me through my profession.”

She now has both cow and buffalos in her farm and is doing well with the business. She sells milk, ghee, curd and her farm is now well recognized by the local people.

Before this program she was not involved in any kind of other trainings, be it an online training or any physical training. It was her first-time experience of using zoom as well.

The training and program were informed by Woman Entrepreneurs Association of Nepal (WEAN) Rupandehi and her expectations from the program was about cattle rearing. However, the training focused on entrepreneurship development and business management really helped her to realize its importance for her business. She shared, “The marketing, and the proper book keeping was the main components that I learned from the program.” She now is planning to implement book keeping in her business from this new fiscal Year.

She hoped that FWEAN would provide many other trainings related to agriculture and cattle rearing and help improve her business. She thanked FWEAN and ILO for the fruitful sessions and wished for similar trainings and other trainings to improve the entrepreneurial skills of woman like her all over the country. Some wise words she shared finally were, “I wish woman move forward by doing great things in their life.”