Editor’s note: Diane MacEachern is an environmental advocate and entrepreneur and the author of Big Green Purse: Use Your Spending Power to Create a Cleaner, Greener World. She is CEO and founder of the website with the same mission, Big Green Purse, and founder of Big Green Breakthrough, which coaches women business owners on incorporating green strategies in order to protect the environment. Here, she writes for wowOwow on why a collapsing Mother Earth is the best place for female entrepreneurs … 

Women business owners and entrepreneurs face the biggest challenges of their lives. The economy is in the tank. The environment seems on the brink of collapse. Things will get worse before they get better.

And yet, this crisis also represents the biggest opportunity of a lifetime. Because we are in such a mess, we must make profound changes. Changes that link revitalizing the economy to protecting the environment. Changes that value families and communities while protecting health and wellness. Changes that build a better tomorrow while enriching our lives today. These changes will not be easy. In fact, they make some people fearful for what the future may hold. I believe these changes are actually very good news, especially for women.

Why? Three reasons:

Protecting the environment is the most promising way to succeed in business. For decades, "old business" advocates successfully argued that we could not have both a clean environment and a thriving economy. We now know nothing could be further from the truth. Safeguarding the planet is the linchpin for our economic renaissance. Protecting the planet for future generations is a top priority for every woman. Creating financial security for ourselves, our families and our communities is also key to our health and well-being. The new green economy is being valued at trillions of dollars. Women are poised to embrace this vision, own it and take advantage of the countless opportunities it presents.

Women Have Begun to Dominate the Workforce. For the first time in history, women are on the verge of overtaking men as the majority of the nation’s breadwinners. We do not celebrate the fact that men’s ranks have been devastated by the recession. However, we acknowledge that the rise of women in the workforce creates an unprecedented opportunity to adopt a new "green" business model that will protect us and future generations while restoring the vitality of our economy. 

The new green economy offers exactly the kind of work/life balance women desire – and that will help restore balance to our communities, country and world, too. Women are looking for meaningful employment in enterprises that are economically rewarding, socially responsible and environmentally beneficial. Women also aim to fulfill their personal goals while cultivating their professional ambitions. The new green economy offers women an enticing win-win, combining the chance to engage their values and, at the same time, achieve extraordinary financial success.

Look what’s already happening: Companies that produce environmentally safe and healthy consumer products are growing at a far greater rate than their conventional counterparts. Unprecedented levels of investment in new energy infrastructure and green business development are taking place, fueled by billions of dollars from the Obama administration’s economic-recovery package. Hundreds of new ventures are rising up to meet customer demand for environmentally safe and healthy services.

According to Women in U.S. Management, a report released in January 2009 by Catalyst, Inc., though the U.S. labor force is comprised of 46.4 percent women, only 15.7 percent of Fortune 500 corporate positions are held by women. No wonder women are starting businesses at twice the rate of men and have become a major force in not just the traditional and e-business marketplace, but the green marketplace as well.
Business guru Peter Drucker once famously said, "The best way to predict the future is to create it."

That sounds like an invitation, don’t you think?

For more information, read A Big Green Declaration for Change: Why Going Green is the Ultimate Success Strategy for Women Entrepreneurs, by Diane MacEachern