FEMALE entrepreneurs used to be a rarity. When Anita Roddick started The Body Shop in the 1980s, she seemed to be ploughing a lone furrow through the male-dominated world of business. Thirty years on, she is still one of only a select few at the top. But things are changing, it seems women are starting to take their rightful place alongside men.

A survey carried out earlier this year revealed more women in the North-East were starting up their own business than anywhere else in Britain. Darlington Federation of Small Businesses reports that of the 430 new businesses established last year, 60 per cent were set up by women.

The increase in female start-ups is partly down to changing cultural trends and expectations. More women are entering further education and more are in the workplace than ever before. Going it alone is a natural progression.

As secretary of the Darlington Federation of Small Businesses, Linda Musgrove has seen dozens of women launch their own companies, and it is a trend she expects will continue.

Linda worked in America for 14 years for a sales organisation that allowed people to try out crafts before taking them up. She left the US three years ago and set up Craft Connection, in Durham. She and her team demonstrate about 20 crafts, including silk painting and working with glass, and they are regulars on the Ideal World shopping channel.

"After working in the States and being instructed all my life, I was very keen to set up on my own," she said.

"As you get to middle age, you start to fear what might happen when you work for someone else. Will your job be safe? This is the perfect solution, and 35 women have set up in the last month alone.

"It is tremendous. Most women have gone through the stage of wanting equality in the workplace, but now they realise there is much more they can do. Women have an amazing ability to juggle lots of different things at once - work, family, children, and having their own business gives them the flexibility to do that. There aren't the restrictions of the nine to five."

There are, however, still considerable barriers. The business culture often fails to address the needs of women. About 40 per cent of start-ups by women are run on a part-time basis because they need to fit work around family commitments and the structures to support part-time work, such as childcare, are often woefully inadequate.

Female employment is still concentrated in the service and retail sectors, where women trail men in pay, training and qualifications. They are also under-represented in management, which means the average female entrepreneur has less managerial experience and access to business networks and finance.

The situation is improving. The Strategic Women's Framework, launched in May last year, was the first government document to support women in business, and established a methodology for banks and other organisations, making them more aware of women's needs.

Another key factor is the link with agencies dedicated to helping small businesses set up. Women into the Network (Win), part of Durham University Business School, has recruited 1,500 members in the past five years and the number is increasing all the time.

When Win was set up five years ago, there were about 700 networks in the North-East alone. Win aims to make women aware of them. It does not deliver services, but organises events and serves as a first port of call, pointing women in the right direction. It also carries out a lot of work with disadvantaged women: lone parents, ex-offenders, so-called third age women, or those who live in rural communities - women who have traditionally felt excluded.

Lisa Vickers, Win event and PR manager, said: "Women are less willing to take risks than men and often lag behind when it comes to confidence in their own abilities and ideas. It is important they have the support and encouragement they need.

"Our research has shown that women find aspirational role models a real boost. We are not talking about Anita Roddick - a lot of women would feel they could not aspire to that - but women who are out there making a success of their business. We run the North-East Woman Entrepreneur of the Year Awards and we are getting more and more women putting themselves forward. They are starting to find the confidence and shout about what they are doing, and that makes other women realise what they can achieve as well.