Socio-economic transformations that have taken place in our country have changed the basic structure of the roles ascribed to women in rural areas. Currently, increasingly they tend to take jobs outside of agriculture, consider setting up their own businesses. Self-employed women as a manifestation of entrepreneurship can also be an opportunity for rural development. This is all the more important that rural areas are in Poland, 93.2 % of the country, where entrepreneurship rates measured by the number of companies per 1000 inhabitants is twice lower than in the cities. In the analyzed Podlasie region, where women represent more than half the population, among economically active persons they are unfortunately the minority and among the economically inactive population, they are over 60.4 %. In addition, women entrepreneurs wishing to run their own business do not receive the adequate institutional support, which probably contributes to their relatively low level of socio-economic activity. There is therefore a need for more support for women in rural areas in order to exploit their potential, for example, the development of rural areas.