A Gender Analysis of Micro-Entrepreneurship in Developing-Transition Countries Insights From Botswana

Int. J. Entrepreneurship and Small Business, Vol. 39, No.
3, 2020 395
A gender analysis of micro-entrepreneurship in

developing-transition countries: insights from
Botswana
Daniel Mmereki*
Department for Management of Science and Technology Development,
and
Faculty of Environment and Labour Safety,
Ton Duc Thang University,
Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Email: dani.mmereki2@tdt.edu.vn
*Corresponding author
Alice Hovorka
School of Environmental Studies and Department of Geography,
Queen’s University,
Kingston, Ontario, K7L 3N6, Canada
Email: alice.hovorka@queensu.ca
Thando Gwebu
Department of Environmental Sciences,
University of Botswana,
Private Bag UB 00704, Gaborone, Botswana
Email: gwebutd@mopipi.ub.bw
Abstract: Policy-makers and members of the donor community have
acknowledged the importance of micro-enterprises to livelihoods in developing
countries. Their contribution to household income is significant to the extent
that in some developing countries it exceeds that of the formal sector. However,
the dearth of information regarding the ways in which male-owned and
female-owned micro-enterprises grow and change over time is becoming a
major academic and policy concern. Using Botswana as the case study country,
this paper presents a qualitative analysis of microenterprises in developing
countries, using data collected on issues of source of start-up capital, perceived
growth, and the dynamics of household decision making in the informal sector.
A number of challenges were identified including inadequacy of policy support
on micro-enterprises, the gap between male and female-owned entrepreneurs in
terms of perceived growth of their operational units and inadequacy of
programs for start-up of micro-enterprises. Comparatively, female-owned
micro-enterprises were faced with a myriad of more challenges than
male-owned micro-enterprises. The outputs are particularly useful to support
decision makers, and focus on enhancing empowerment and awareness on
available support programs to female entrepreneurs for employment creation in
specific locations.
Copyright © 2020 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

396 D. Mmereki et al.
Keywords: male-owned micro-enterprise; female-owned micro-enterprises;

growth rate; performance; policy support; Botswana.
Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Mmereki, D.,

Hovorka, A. and Gwebu, T. (2020) ‘A gender analysis of
micro-entrepreneurship in developing-transition countries: insights from
Botswana’, Int. J. Entrepreneurship and Small Business, Vol. 39, No. 3,
pp.395–429.
Biographical notes: Daniel Mmereki is a part-time international researcher at

the Department for Management of Science and Technology, Ton Duc Thang
University, Vietnam: Faculty of Environment and Labour Safety, Ton Duc
Thang University, Vietnam. From 2013 to 2015, he was a Postdoctoral Fellow
at the College of Civil Engineering, Chongqing University, China. He is also a
researcher at the National Centre for International Research of Low-Carbon and
Green Buildings at Chongqing University, China.
Alice Hovorka is a Professor and Director at the School of Environmental

Studies, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada. Her research program
broadly explores human-environment relationships and is theoretically
informed by feminist, poststructuralist and post-humanist philosophical
perspectives. She explores issues related to animal geographies, gender and
environment, urban geography, and Southern Africa.
Thando Gwebu was a Professor at the Department of Environmental Sciences,

University of Botswana, Botswana. He is a population geographer by training.
His research interests include population-development-and the environment,
population and the elderly, gender and the environment, gender and
development and orphans and vulnerable children. He is also a consultant.
1 Introduction
Globally, most international livelihood policy programs and national policies have been
specifically designed for entrepreneurs because the informal sector is identified as a
contributor to sustainable development and poverty alleviation. The contribution of the
informal sector to household income is significant to an extent that in some developing
countries it exceeds that of the formal sector (Ardianti and Inggrid, 2018). McPherson
(1996) noted that despite the growing understanding of its importance, there was no
widespread interest in the potential benefits of the micro-enterprise sector in the middle
of this century as development economists advocated large-scale and capital-intensive
investment. Definitely, in many developing countries micro-enterprise activities are
either directly or indirectly discouraged by governments (Rijkers and Costa, 2012).
Nevertheless, this trend has been changing rapidly as an ever-growing number of
researchers, policymakers, and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have begun to
examine the possibilities of this sector as an engine of economic growth (Elizbarashvili,
n.d.; Mead and Liedholm, 1998).
As proposed by the World Bank, supporting micro-enterprise activities could be seen
as a part of a ‘redistribution with growth’ plan. Such a plan seeks to support directly or
indirectly the efforts of the underprivileged members of society, a category which
includes most female owners and female-headed households (World Bank, 1995). Based
A gender analysis of micro-entrepreneurship 397
on the proponents of such a plan, more equitable income distributions and economic
growth can occur simultaneously. This could be in terms of employment creation by the
informal sector in developing countries (International Labour Organization, ILO, 2002),
with the poor serving as an engine of economic development and serving as an
entrepreneurial ‘seed bed’ (Kilby, 1971), with entrepreneurs graduating to subsequently
run larger enterprise industries. Most importantly, the informal sector affects the living
standards of men and women that otherwise fall below the poverty datum line, thus
increasing women’s and men’s ability to improve their living conditions (Fried, 1998;
ILO, 1995, 2002). Elizbarashvili (n.d.) pointed out that entrepreneurship in the informal
sector is an important source of job creation and provides an opening of career
opportunities for both men and women who cannot be absorbed into the formal sector.
Hannan-Anderson (1995) noted that entrepreneurship in the informal sector should be
seen by policy-makers and donors as a means of economically empowering marginalised
groups, including disadvantaged women.
The main goal of this paper is to analyse micro-enterprise activities in developing
countries, using data collected from Gaborone in Botswana, and southern Africa.
Botswana was chosen because it is reported to be a front-runner in supportive policy
environment for micro-enterprises. A detailed survey was carried out on microenterprises
ranging in size, and operated by both males and females. The contributions of this paper
are mainly empirical even though the results to be presented may provide a broader basis
for improving the growth of micro-enterprise activities in the future. Furthermore, the
main contribution of this paper is to show existence of entrepreneurship-specific factors
that are associated with male-and-female-owned micro-enterprises (e.g., startup capital,
skills, growth). The use of the term ‘micro-enterprises’ to describe female and
male-owned businesses in Botswana, in contradistinction to ‘small businesses’, is our
preferred terminology because the largest employ fewer workers, and the internationally
accepted definitions suggest that small businesses employ anywhere from 10 to 50 people
(European Commission, 2011; Thomas et al., 1997).
2 The context
Botswana has recently transformed into a middle-upper income country (World Bank,
2017), with more than half of the population still having the middle class status and most
people in the working class brackets. In recent years, the country has experienced rapid
economic growth, of at least 5% per annum, and higher standards of living, although it
has periodically felt effects of economic recession as those experienced by other
developing-transition countries around the world (World Bank, 2017). Furthermore, the
country is experiencing rapid urbanisation, with the projected proportion of the total
population living in urban areas growing from 41% in 1990 to 64% by 2011 and is
expected to continue increasing (Statistics Botswana, 2013). The rapid urbanisation of
Botswana has generated an increased demand for services and products for the
population, thus leading to the development of informal entrepreneurship.
The economy of Botswana has different characteristics from other African countries.
A comparison by Dana and Ratten (2016) on Botswana and other sub-Saharan countries
showed that the country’s job growth expectation is higher partly due to the country
having a market-oriented economy with Africa’s sovereign credit rating and having one
of the most competitive banking sectors in Africa, with financial resources available for
entrepreneurs based on markets rates. In addition, the Government of Botswana provides

some subsidised loans and has abundant resources and boasts of the largest and richest
diamond mines. The discovery of diamonds in Botswana has led to a deep dependency on
the international demand for diamonds, as the product constitutes 30%–40% of the
country’s gross domestic product (GDP), 50% of government income and a high
exportation rate of 80%, making the economy capital incentive (Lansford, 2015; Boiro,
2017). The economy of the country is dominated by mining, in particular the diamond
industry. However, the mining industry is expected to run out in 2030. This calls for the
diversification of the private sector by encouraging entrepreneurial communities (Dana
and Ratten, 2016). The GDP per capita is estimated to be around $6,041.0. Associated
with this, the country is believed to be moving from a developing to a transitional country
(International Monetary Fund: World Economic Outlook Database, 2016). In addition,
the rate of lifestyle changes is higher than in other parts of Africa, as reflected by an
increase in mobile telephony, Internet usage, etc. It has been observed that the significant
economic progress of Botswana has been sustained by its expenditure on education,
being among the highest in the world (Dana and Ratten, 2016). In recent years, it has also
significantly improved the overall business environment, being ranked 72 out of the 190
countries, in the Doing Business Report of 2018 (IBRD/World Bank Doing Business,
2018), ranking above African countries such as South Africa (73), Kenya (108) and
Nigeria (169), thus showing that the country is growing in the international trading
environment.
Botswana’s economic freedom score is 69.9, making its economy the 35th freest in
the 2018 global index, is ranked 2nd among 47 countries in the Sub-Saharan Africa
region. Its overall score was above the regional and world averages (The Heritage
Foundation, 2018). On global competitiveness, Botswana is ranked 64th out of 134
countries and is ranked 10th in macro-economic environment, infrastructure in 90th
place, innovation in 84th place, business sophistication in 100th place, technological
readiness in 68th place, labour market efficiency in 36th place and creative outputs in
84th place (International Monetary Fund: World Economic Outlook Database, 2016).
One of the possible explanations for this success has been attributed to government
efforts, which have been made in this segment (Boiro, 2017). Nevertheless, in certain
segments that make up the overall business environment, major reforms and adjustments
are still desirable.
For insert diversification purposes it has been noted that the government has given
attention to other segments including those focusing on entrepreneurial and creative
activity (Dana and Ratten, 2016). This is associated with the country being described as
the least corrupt country in Africa according to transparency international [e.g., having
achieved the 34th place on the organisation’s corruption perception index (CPI) of 2017]
for the 22nd year in a row, which also reached a top position of several different global
rankings for governance, business and anti-corruption standards. It has been indicated
that in order for transparency international to rank countries, expert opinions are sought
based on the press’ liberty, limitations of retrieving data with regards to public
disbursement, and reliability and satisfactory performance of public services such as the
judiciary and police-and their independence (Corruption Perceptions Index, 2017, 2018;
Boiro, 2017). Based on these indicators, Botswana is perceived as a less corrupt country
above almost two thirds of the European member states, and members of the European
Union (EU) and Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)
countries like Italy, Greece and Hungary, suggesting that some European countries like
Spain, Italy and the Czech Republic could learn from this excelling African state (Boiro,
2017). Thus, this makes it an exceptional African country, which could be exemplary to
other African states to follow in its steps.
Regarding the political environment, Botswana is regarded as a model of democracy,
being the continent’s longest continuous multi-party democracy. One of the possible
explanations for this is that Botswana’s political power has never been in the hands of the
military, making it possible to avoid the current paths that many African countries have
bled through. Furthermore, it has been noted that Botswana never underwent such
devastating political and social damages as other African states under their colonial rulers
due to the fact that the local polity’s structures and rules were tightened by the colonisers
(Boiro, 2017). And the majority of the entrepreneurial activities in the African countries,
some of which were colonies, have an influence from the western world, thus adopting
western-type regulations. Whilst many other African states were colonised, it has been
noted that Botswana was fortunate to function as a protectorate instead of a colony,
which left the country outside the more extensive bureaucratic ruling which the countries
surrounding it had to undergo, meaning that Botswana did not have to tolerate the same
extent of colonial disruption (Cook and Sarkin, 2010; Boiro, 2017). Again, Botswana has
an excellent reputational background of strong rule of law since independence and has
been recognised for its participatory democracy (Boiro, 2017).
The above political and socio-economic positive aspects can be gleaned from
Botswana’s position on a global perspective, consequently, demonstrate a conducive
environment for entrepreneurship. Based on a comparison of the Republic of Botswana
and other transition countries in Africa in the business environment, it can be seen that
Botswana is in a very similar position with advanced countries. For improved results and
a favourable entrepreneurial process, it is necessary for concerted efforts in all areas on a
continuous basis by the relevant stakeholders, including consultants, policy-makers, civil
society, and the public as well as international organisations to provide a favourable
environment for informal entrepreneurship. With regards to the key sectors that make up
the environment for entrepreneurial activities, the situation in the country is as follows:
• Harmonised and successful economic policies.
• Free trade and markets.
• Entrepreneurship spirit and abundance of informal entrepreneurship.
• Community-based entrepreneurship.
All these aspects display unique factors the country has compared to other African states.
Concerning the participation of males and females on the total workforce with other
African countries in the region, the same situation prevails, where the numbers of females
in the total work force is lower, i.e., 50.4% of males and 49.6% of females (Statistics
Botswana, 2017). Thus, based on the employment figures, an assumption can be made
that the unemployment of females may be higher that the share of males, which
aptly reflects their participation in informal entrepreneurship for self-employment among
the female population. It is crucial to understand the characteristics of
micro-entrepreneurship in order to implement uniquely fitting policies. The topic of
gender and micro-entrepreneurship deserves an in-depth analysis of the paths taken by
developing countries including Botswana.
Botswana has defied the continued generalisation of African countries being defective
in economic management, governance structures, and financial discipline. This has
resulted in the country reaching top rank positions of several different global rankings for
governance, business and anti-corruption standards. This research will examine
Botswana’s informal entrepreneurship for purposes of demonstrating a degree of
applicability for other African states to follow in its steps.
3 Policy regarding small business support in Botswana
Past research has shown that small medium and micro-enterprises (SMMEs) are the
backbone of most transition economies around the world (Storey, 1994). Thus, SMMEs
provide a means for empowering the economy of every nation. Moreover, they contribute
to GDP, employment creation, poverty eradication and economic diversification.
Therefore, it is worth noting that due to the contribution of small business to the
economy, the Government of Botswana is highly concerned with developing
entrepreneurship especially among youths (Rhodes, 2012) and has realised the
importance of small businesses in fostering economic growth and employment creation.
This has led to the introduction, over the last two decades, of targeted policy support (i.e.,
the SMME policy) (Jefferis, 2014) as well as advisory programs to help Batswana
establish their own enterprises (Jaiyeoba and Robert-Lombard, 2016; Jaiyeoba, 2013).
The government has done much to create a sound business environment through
provision of infrastructure and enactment of laws and regulations to facilitate the
operations of small businesses. The strength of Botswana’s policy on small business lies
on the creation of productive employment opportunities and empowering SMMEs,
particularly those that are run by citizens, with 100% ownership. The current policy for
Botswana emphasises citizen empowerment by helping to fund, train, advise, mentor and
uplift entrepreneurs (Citizen Entrepreneurial Development Agency, 2012; Government of
Botswana, 1999). Thus, a lot of effort has been put in place by the government and other
stakeholders such as banks to finance SMMEs to help them succeed. In particular, the
government has established two financial schemes – the micro credit scheme and the
credit guarantee scheme – to provide citizens with easy access to start-up capital and
adopted the national policy on small, medium and micro enterprises, which was drafted
in 1999 by a Task Force on SMEs led by the private sector (Sentsho et al., 2007;
Botswana Guardian Newspaper, 2013).
The government also established the Citizen Entrepreneurial Development Agency
(CEDA), formerly the Financial Assistance Policy (FAP), the Local Enterprise Authority
(LEA), and SBC (Sentsho et al., 2007). All these services were provided through
consultations with all the relevant stakeholders. It has, however, to be noted that these
were set up more in reaction to specific problems encountered rather than as the basis of a
comprehensive and more focused government policy on small businesses. As a result,
SMMEs have been credited with employment creation, bearing in mind that each year
Botswana produces thousands of graduates that do not have ready employment that
translates to citizen empowerment, increase in GDP, increase in tax revenue to the
government-which in turn translates into development of the whole country, and keeping
youths busy thereby reducing idling and mischief (Mchombu, 2000; Mutoko, 2014). In
Botswana, it has been confirmed that SMMEs contribute 75% of formal sector
employment (Republic of Botswana, 2010). For instance, in 1998, there were
approximately 56,000 SMMEs (Hinton et al., 2006; Newell, 1996; Sentsho et al., 2007;
Gagoitseope and Pansiri, 2012; Mooko and Serema, 2014). A report on the role of SMEs
in Botswana found that these enterprises’ contribution to GDP was estimated at
30%–45%, while that of large firms was estimated at 38%–48% of GDP (Government of
Botswana, 1998). Thus, it is believed that SMEs account for 15% of formal employment,
which implies that employment creation is one of their most significant contributions
(Gagoitseope and Pansiri, 2012).
Compared to other countries within the South African Development Community
(SADC) region, Botswana is regarded as a front runner in policy support regarding small
business. The regulatory policy instruments also spans several government departments
(Temtime and Pansiri, 2004). Some empirical literature has shown that policy support for
small business in some of the neighbouring countries such as, Swaziland, Lesotho and
Zimbabwe is somewhat limited, and this has led to relatively poor performance of small
businesses, threatening economic growth and employment creation. In these countries,
lack of finance has been a major bottleneck for small businesses (McPherson, 1996).
Thus, small businesses in these countries are not showing signs of growth and
self-sustenance due to scarcity of financial resources. The scarcity or abundance is
critical of resources needed by small businesses operating within any given environment
(Randolph and Dess, 1984). The resources available within an environment influence the
survival and growth rate of businesses; they also affect the abilities of new businesses to
enter this environment (Randolph and Dess, 1984).
It is indicated that the growth and progress of enterprises is positively associated with
the range of strategy, organisation and options available to small businesses, including
market orientation dynamics (Rijkers and Costa, 2012; McPherson, 1996). With an
abundance of resources, it is relatively easy for small businesses to survive, and pursue
goals other than survival. Nevertheless, with limited or scarce resources, competition
intensifies (Dess and Beard, 1984), adversely affecting growth rates and profitability of
small business. Together, these findings suggest that effective policy framework is an
important aspect to sustainability and growth of small businesses. In the case of
South Africa, the national average for small businesses conditions appears to be
progressive in all stages of small business entrepreneurship. Other countries are still
grappling with establishing programs and resources for growth and performance of small
businesses. For example, countries such as Swaziland, Lesotho and Zimbabwe are
reportedly lacking more focused government policy on small businesses, thereby
affecting the survival rates of small SMMEs (McPherson, 1996). Therefore, in these
countries small businesses are not at progressive stages of economic growth and
employment creation. Among these countries, only South Africa uses a combination of
programs to increase participation in employment creation through the informal sector,
while in other countries lack of focused policies is still a limitation, slowing the growth of
small businesses. In countries such as Lesotho and Swaziland policies supporting small
businesses are either rare, or absent (Temtime and Pansiri, 2004). Besides, support
programs are not readily available to foster citizen entrepreneurship, empowerment to
encourage the development of a competitive and sustainable SME community. In these
countries, small businesses cannot maximise their long-run performance and growth
(McPherson, 1996). This is caused by the constrained and shrinking economic situations.
As a result, the challenges of upgrading supportive programs and resources for
sustainable small businesses are much more difficult in most of these developing
countries. Therefore, concerted efforts are urgently needed for improvements of programs
and resources to support small businesses in the neighbouring countries for employment
creation and economic growth.
To improve the existing conditions, extensive research is needed to assess the present
situation in efforts to support small businesses in these countries among the diverse
socioeconomic players. Furthermore, a systemic approach is suggested aiming at
strengthening the economic and social infrastructure needed for small business
development, including concerted efforts needed for economic diversification and the
growth of enterprises providing goods and services.
Despite the government’s policy support for small businesses, inadequacy in policy
implementation in Botswana has led to a hostile market environment for small business
growth and performance characterised by intense competition and lack of exploitable
opportunities, access to markets, and financial issues (Gagoitseope and Pansiri, 2012).
Furthermore, it is characterised by ineffective entrepreneurial orientation, which may be
especially useful in uncertain or turbulent environments (Stanbic Bank Botswana, 2013).
This is because entrepreneurship orientation may be a useful platform for small business
growth and performance. Several empirical studies have found a strong positive
relationship between entrepreneurial orientation and performance, whether one looks at
consumer products, new products, innovation or service. Other challenges affecting
SMMEs include lack of premises, excessive laws and regulations, lack of information on
government assistance programs, lack of business start-up training and lack of
entrepreneurial ‘role models’ (Mutoko, 2014). Essentially, the policy does not reach its
full potential due to the above challenges, somewhat limiting the survival rates of SMEs
in Botswana. Therefore, more concerted efforts are needed to develop policies that help
SMMEs to access Africa’s domestic market and information on government assistance
programs.
4 Comparison between entrepreneurship in Botswana and other countries
As discussed earlier in this article, entrepreneurship has been viewed as contributing to

economic development through the creation of employment opportunities, increased
wealth and income, and the linking of local economy to the global arena. As a result,
entrepreneurial support has been increasing among policymakers, academia and
practitioners (Anggadwita et al., 2016). One of the most influential of these aspects is that
the environment must be supportive to entrepreneurship activities in a country, since a
country’s regulatory environment affects its entrepreneurship characteristics and growth
(Hisrich and Al-Dabbagh, 2012). In general, most industrialised countries have policies
for promoting entrepreneurial activities, which motivates the necessity to venture into
business and adopt innovation activities (Licha and Brem, 2018; Vannebo and Grande,
2018; Spanò et al., 2018). Several studies on factors affecting entrepreneurship activities
have been carried out throughout the world (Rezaei et al., 2013). Licha and Brem (2018)
compared entrepreneurship education in Europe with insights from Germany and
Denmark. They found that the different universities undertook entrepreneurship
education and offered related programs for bachelor and master students, focusing on
practical experiences, experimental teaching and the involvement of guest lecturers. They
also observed that the universities offered cross-faculty electives and extra-curricular
activities to connect students from different faculties, which provided the opportunity to
network with investors, support organisations and participate in business plan
competition. Regrettably, in most of the developing countries, policy for promoting

entrepreneurship activities is mostly transposed from industrialised countries to
developing ones without applying country-specific ideologies. Thus, the environment for
promoting entrepreneurial activities is still not conducive to stimulate the growth and
performance of small business and insufficient efforts had been made to promote the
sector (Dana, 2007).
In the African context, although the informal sector impacts the daily lives of the
people due to its perception as an economic development endeavour (Dana and Ratten,
2015; Ayande, 2013), the drivers for promoting small businesses seem incompatible with
the principles of thriving entrepreneurship activities, which is heavily influenced by the
lack of an appropriate policy framework for implementing venture programs for small
businesses (Dana, 2007); currently, there are schemes for small businesses that are not
adequately implemented to promote entrepreneurship due to a lack of policy framework.
Although policy framework on entrepreneurship may vary in relation to gender
inclusivity and across countries, there might be some interesting commonalities. To start
with, gender gaps in participation in entrepreneurial activities are highest in these
countries, thus scoring higher on the aggregate gender parity indexes. This is particularly
a striking result when one considers these participation patterns in developing countries
that women are not actively involved in wage employment. Females in informal
entrepreneurship activities are on average less productive and labour productivity is
highly dispersed. It is worth noting that entrepreneurship activity patterns by gender are
likely to be more pronounced, but varying from country to country. Therefore, promoting
entrepreneurial activities can be associated with developing a supportive regulatory
environment framework that strongly favours the entrepreneurship spirit, addresses
gender gaps and is opposed to corruption.
Past research in African countries (Dana, 2007) has shown that promoting
entrepreneurship have not gained satisfactory attention or delivered well-functioning
entrepreneurship activities due to government bureaucracy, lack of infrastructure, lack of
technology, corruption, and limited access to financing. These countries lack
well-established regulatory environments for entrepreneurial activities. Thus, African
countries have higher populations in the informal entrepreneurship sector due to the
limited programs of promoting sustainable participation of entrepreneurs, and policy
frameworks that have not been adequately implemented. Most of the policy support for
entrepreneurship in these countries is still at infancy or inconsistent with real situation in
these countries. Meanwhile, information on gender differences in entrepreneurship in
these countries is somewhat scarce, which calls for more attention from the research
community. This can help to develop a dynamic understanding of why these gender
differences exist.
In Macedonia, the EU Competitiveness and Innovation Program (CIP) for the period
of 2007–2013 has been adopted. Since the adoption of the CIP, the authorities have been
putting emphasis on the promotion of small medium enterprises. According to Ramadani
et al. (2015) support for female’s entrepreneurship has been implemented in Macedonia
through the European network of mentors for females. In Botswana, due to the lack of
special programs for educating and encouraging them to start their own businesses and
careers, there is unavailability of mentorship programs for female entrepreneurs. Thus,
most female entrepreneurs are lagging behind, which is associated with the challenges
they face at the start of business operations.
Furthermore, with regards to Europe, training programs and support for female
micro-entrepreneurs are seen as a possibility for development of entrepreneurial activities
in regions with growing female entrepreneurship but insufficient assistance in both
starting and growing a business, such as Albania, Macedonia and Kosovo (i.e.,
ALMAKOS countries) (Ramadani et al., 2015) and Montenegro (Dinc and Hadzic,
2018). Although Botswana has made significant progress in supporting entrepreneurial
activities, it still requires further modification in all aspects of the policy framework to
foster growth in entrepreneurship activities. In European transition states such as Albania
and Kosovo, programs exist to support female in their entrepreneurial activities, aimed at
providing strategies and plans for development of these activities (Ramadani et al., 2015).
In contrast, Botswana’s progress in supporting female entrepreneurial activities remains a
daunting task compared to these countries due to lack of strong government support for
female entrepreneurs. Therefore, targets to be achieved on female entrepreneurial
activities have not yet been set or are unclear. This lack of strong government support is a
major challenge for developing effective entrepreneurial activity. In order to address
entrepreneurship challenges faced by females in entrepreneurship, there is an urgent need
for concerted efforts to involve the relevant stakeholders and policymakers, and engage
females and civil society to meet the needs of individuals starting entrepreneurial careers,
and provide capacity and innovation in African countries. The main reason is that
entrepreneurs are considered imperative for the long-term economic growth of any
country (Dinc and Hadzic, 2018).
In Egypt, support for informal entrepreneurship has been given higher priority by
creating the Small Enterprise Credit Program (SECP), while Botswana struggles to give
attention to the change of the status of informal entrepreneurship. Undeniably, religion
has a strong impact on gender norms and income. It has been noted that Egypt has the
highest levels of gender parity because of the religion, Muslim. Consequently, females
are much less likely to engage in income earning activities and gender differences in
entrepreneurship are more likely to be larger. As a result, the Egyptian authorities have
offered initiatives to carry out informal entrepreneurship, thus providing a plan to assist
informal entrepreneurs and include small-scale entrepreneurs in credit financing. This
practice has proved to be a very effective strategy for a country with a high population in
informal entrepreneurial activities. According to Dana (2000), the success of the SECP
experiment in Egypt can serve as an example to other nations as well, including
developing and transition countries. In Botswana, the support for female entrepreneurship
is a little different; there is a lack of supportive regulatory framework for informal
businesses, making it hard for these entrepreneurs to enter formal business arrangements
that include long-term contracts (Dana and Ratten, 2015), and the sector remains
marginalised due to the difficulties of gaining access to centralised financial resources to
encourage informal entrepreneurship. Thus, most informal entrepreneurs are discouraged
by the regulatory structure designed by the Government of Botswana, which contracts
entrepreneurial spirit of those engaged in these activities. Furthermore, this also leads to
gender differences in participation in entrepreneurial activities.
The measures that Botswana still needs to take in order to promote entrepreneurial
activities are extensive. The characteristics of small businesses are parallel with the
characteristics of the informal entrepreneurship in other African countries. The detailed
characteristics and structures of entrepreneurship in Botswana and West African
countries are found in Dana and Ratten (2015) and Dana (2007) respectively. However,
compared to most of the African nations, for instance-it can be noted that Botswana has
already made some progress (Dana and Ratten, 2016). Entrepreneurial activities in
Botswana have been widely entrenched in the education system, although this does not
yet cover the informal sector of the rural areas. In West African countries like Ghana and
Togo, Dana (2007) found that entrepreneurship activities suffered from lack of literacy
and other skills among the labour force, lack of managerial skills, lack of access to
technology, lack of access to capital and lack of infrastructure, thus dampening any
existing entrepreneurial spirit. There is no official policy framework in the countries, only
new venture programs, North American style programs, despite the countries having a
multitude of micro-businesses. In spite of their increasing policy-prominence, relatively
little is known about gender inequities in informal entrepreneurship labour market
outcomes. This is unfortunate since informal entrepreneurship account for a substantial
share of income generation and employment creation. Due to these limitations, the
indigenous population growth has not been matched by a growth in agriculture and
business activity. A comparative study by Dana (2007) observed that SMEs development
in Ghana and Togo is characterised by inefficient programs, lack of an environmentally
sensitive policy framework ensuring more efficient use of funds, excessive regulation and
lack of entrepreneurial spirit. These are explained in more details in Dana (2007).
However, information on the gender differences in entrepreneurial activities is not
available in the Botswana’s dataset.
Thus, it is clear that although Botswana is making progress in promoting informal
entrepreneurship, the policy approaches have been very slow. According to Dana and
Ratten (2015), Botswana’s situation compares positively to other African countries, but it
is still far from the policy approaches achieved by ALMAKOS countries. Since a healthy
informal entrepreneurship can contribute to the development of the economy, mainly by
employment creation, (Ramadani et al., 2015), more effort is needed to establish policy
approaches to break the economic impracticability of informal entrepreneurship, to
reduce the information asymmetry between formal and informal institutions, and to create
awareness about the benefits of both informal and formal work, thus placing emphasis on
the values of economic activities and the resulting societal benefits (Dana and Ratten,
2015) and also reduce gender disparities in entrepreneurial activities and outcomes,
taking into the differences in size and sector.
5 Entrepreneurship performance and gender-based considerations
Business start-up and operating entrepreneurship and its performance are functions of
many variables (Abazi-Alili et al., 2017). The performance of businesses is directly
dependent on favourable regulations provided in any given country (Dana and Ratten,
2015). Thus, providing favourable conditions for entrepreneurship remains a critical
issue. Performance of entrepreneurship is usually associated with innovation activities
(Baronet and Reviren, 2010). In particular, entrepreneurial activities are influenced by a
number of innovative factors as detailed in Abazi-Alili et al. (2017). Other studies (Sohn
et al., 2007; Wolff and Pett, 2006) have noted that innovative activities are affected by
ownership structure, export activity, research and development (R&D) intensity, and
management skills. It has been reported that the knowledge from different aspects,
including operational systems, local abilities, know-how and many others, play a
significant role in increasing firm-performance. Besides, a successful business requires a
relevant education, proper knowledge and skills, and a commitment to choose proactive
rather than reactive actions (De Faria and Mendonca, 2011; Baronet and Riverin, 2010).
These include experience, persistence, perseverance and self-confidence, which are also
considered important characteristics for the successful development of any business
(Ramadani et al., 2015, 2013; Ramadani and Dana, 2013). Meanwhile, the characteristics
of entrepreneurs are associated with their performance to achieve the success or failure of
their efforts, which is measured by looking at business survival or growth (Clausen,
2011). Nag and Das (2017) highlighted three entrepreneurial traits-need for achievement,
self-efficacy and locus of control (internal), which were positively related to business
success, and that passion for work played a mediating role in this relationship (Nag and
Das, 2017).
Past research suggested that female entrepreneurs have an important role in
promoting social and economic development of a country in both rural and urban areas
(Anggadwita et al., 2015, 2017; Anggadwita and Dhewanto, 2016). The detailed reasons
for the importance of female entrepreneurial activities are found in Ramadani and Dana
(2014). Studies systematically investigating factors affecting performance of business and
gender-based issues are highlighted. In a study in Egypt, which showed that although
counter to cultural values and availability of funds for informal entrepreneurship, 90% of
the borrowers were male entrepreneurs compared to their female counterparts (Dana,
2000). Studies (Anggadwita et al., 2017) investigating the participation of females in
entrepreneurship have concluded that they are faced with a myriad of constraints to
engage in economic activities. Anggadwita and Dhewanto (2016) highlighted some of the
constraints faced by females in entrepreneurship in Indonesia. Ramadani et al. (2015),
too, highlighted the problems of females in entrepreneurship in Macedonia. Considering
the innovation activities between male and female entrepreneurs, it is expected that
male-owned businesses, which can obtain financial assistance from credit institutions,
have higher education, and management skills will be more efficient than their
female-owned counterparts.
Furthermore, it has been reported that the ability of enterprises to innovate depends
on the employees’ level of education. While female entrepreneurs in transition countries
such as ALMAKOS countries have obtained higher education, this is not the case in
Botswana. For instance, a study in these countries has shown that 73% of women
surveyed had a university degree, 19% had postgraduate studies, only 8% had secondary
education and only 1% had primary education (Ramadani et al., 2015), translating into
better educated entrepreneurs in comparison to those from Botswana.
Summarising these findings, it is evident that male-owned enterprises would have an
improved performance during the transition period than female-owned enterprises, which
would be reflected by the increase in the addition of product and/or services, hence
improving productivity.
6 Data and explanatory variables
In developing countries, including Botswana, fewer studies have been conducted on

factors influencing growth of male-and-female-owned micro-enterprises. One of the key
considerations related to the prospects of micro-enterprise is growth: for example, if male
and female entrepreneurs cannot be trained or empowered to grow their businesses, then
future prospects are limited. Fewer studies conducted in Africa and Asia focused on the
quantitative profiles of micro-enterprises, and they are not gendered. Also, research has
focused only on profiles of micro-enterprises and showed that they shared certain
common characteristics, namely: limited or no access to resources, temporary structures,
encroachment on private land, and lack of any operational premises, or operation in
unauthorised locations within cities (Sethuraman, 1998; Jospeh 2003). Some researchers
(Ntseane, 1999; Butale, 2001) have pointed out that micro-enterprises were small scale
operations; used little capital and skills, employed fewer people and failed to comply with
legislative and institutional framework.
Jamak et al. (2014) pointed out that those involved in the informal sector lacked free
access to market, technical skills, sales and marketing skills, financial literacy,
management skills, and lacked information and opportunities, and as a result operated in
a different business environment than firms in the formal sector. Sethuraman (1998)
maintained that the owners of the micro-enterprises were the poor and underprivileged,
who were disproportionately under-represented in the decision-making process,
marginally productive and relied on their own savings from meagre incomes. As a result,
they established and operated less productive micro-enterprises. Mokgosi (1997)
highlighted the profiles of micro-enterprises such as size, ownership, attributes of the
owners, status of registration or licensing, lack of proper physical premises, location
either in residence or concentration in shopping complexes or malls where population
tends to agglomerate or operate without fixed location, and absence of machinery and
equipment. The methodology has been preoccupied with the establishment-type of
surveys, which had many limitations in shedding light on the informal economic activity.
From these studies, it appeared that very little effort has been expended to elicit the
voices of the actors who are the key players in this economic scene. This paper adopted a
qualitative or comprehensive research approach to complement and enrich previous
studies on the growth and performance of male-owned and female-owned enterprises.
Furthermore, this qualitative or comprehensive research approach provided a detailed
picture of the challenges that confronted males and females in the informal sector. The
methodology employed by this paper provided insights and commentary about male’s
and female’s experiences in micro-enterprises. Furthermore, it provided a synthesis of the
critical issues which affected male and female entrepreneurs.
7 Data collection
Case studies involve thorough study, in-depth and detail, of a limited number of objects,
individuals or environments, and also the effective use of qualitative method and include
observation and interviews (Dana and Dana, 2005). A case study approach was adopted
in order to obtain in-depth information with regards to male-and-female-owned
micro-enterprises in the study area, using a qualitative or comprehensive research
approach to understand the views and perceptions of males and females involved in
informal sector activities in Phiring, Gaborone, Botswana. The reason behind the choice
of this approach was the assumption that qualitative research designs are more
appropriate than quantitative approaches for examining the complexity of
micro-enterprise activities. Past research encourages researchers studying entrepreneurs
to employ qualitative methodologies because they enable researchers to gain in-depth
understanding of contextual issues (Dana and Dana, 2005), thus helping researchers to
gain an in-depth understanding of the entrepreneurship process. One of the explanations
when using a case study in entrepreneurship is that it helps to gain a deeper and holistic
understanding of the research. Thus, qualitative data enables the researcher to learn
directly from the research subject, thereby reducing measurement errors common in
survey studies which often need to make assumptions (Dana and Dana, 2005), and the
researcher gains an in-depth understanding of contextual issues by listening to voices of
participants and becoming sensitised to what participants narrate. Furthermore,
qualitative data provide a means of understanding phenomena within their context (Yin,
2009). Thus, qualitative data provide a means of understanding the contextual
phenomena through emerging patterns, themes and categories (Yin, 2003). Past research
suggests that adopting a case technique allows our knowledge and understanding of such
pertinent and critical factors. Given the advantages of qualitative or comprehensive
approach, the need for a qualitative study technique was to gain an in-depth
understanding of the present dynamics of the informal sector in the selected study area.
This case study was predominantly qualitative rather than quantitative. The information
provided in this paper was generated by surveys in Gaborone, Botswana.
8 Sample selection
Deciding on an apt sampling technique is an essential aspect of social research that

accounts for the quality of the usage of research procedures (Matthews and Ross, 2010).
In this study, qualitative snowball sampling, based on Yin (2009), Matthews and Ross
(2010), and Cresswell (2012), was adopted, which is a form of purposeful sampling
technique that typically proceeds after a study begins and occurs when the researcher
asks participants to recommend other individuals to be sampled, and was used to locate
existing female-and-male-owned micro-enterprises in the study area. Qualitative
snowball sampling was also used to compliment convenience sampling, especially when
it was difficult to locate the informal sector activities (the less established informal sector
businesses) falling within the sampling frame. The snowball sampling technique was
utilised due to lack of access to adequate sampling frame.
Since knowledge on the number of micro-enterprises was somewhat limited in the
study area, and there seemed to be no information about their nature and location in the
country literature, our surveys employed a non-probability sampling, which refers to any
technique in which samples are selected in some way not suggested by the probability
theory. This sampling technique rescues the inadequacy of the probability method,
especially where it would not be appropriate to use probability sampling even if it were
possible (Babbie, 2004). The non-probability sampling techniques involved the selection
of key informants (usually individuals who are well acquainted with the informal sector
and regulatory issues), and then convenience sampling (usually used on the basis of the
availability and ease of data collection). As noted by Yin (2009), key informants are often
critical to the success of a case study as such provides the case study investigator with
insights into the matter and can also initiate access to corroboratory or contrary sources of
evidence. The informants are viewed as helpful in identifying entrepreneurs, their role in
the community, the nature of entrepreneurial activities and their products as perceived by
the consumers, etc. (Dana and Dana, 2005). It is accepted that the snowball technique
used was not representative of the whole population, but it facilitated contact with a
group that might otherwise have been difficult to access. In comparison to quantitative
research, it has been noted that qualitative research does not need to comprise a large
sample; therefore, the researcher may opt to
1 concentrate on a very small sample of individual entrepreneurs

2 take a comparative approach, suggesting that option (1) may retain more richness
when it comes to description (Dana and Dana, 2005).
Therefore a total of 60 semi-structured face-to-face in-depth interviews were conducted
with male and female entrepreneurs. This approach enabled the collection of
comprehensive information and allowed the respondents to answer questions without any
restrictions, by using their own words and expressing their personal perspectives
(Henderson and Bialeschki, 2002; Patton, 2002). Three days before the interviews, we
took time to visit the individual female-and male-owned businesses to educate and inform
all members about the purpose of our study and about the need for them to participate in
it. Interestingly, and to our surprise, we were fondly received and all the micro-enterprise
members accepted our request on condition that their names and those of their businesses
would not appear in any published report, which we also accepted. It is important to state
that the interviews were held using both English and Setswana to allow entrepreneurs to
use the language that they were comfortable with; this made our work much simpler.
9 Qualitative interviewing and recording
It has been indicated that data collected through qualitative or comprehensive research is
rich and heterogeneous (Yin, 2008; Dana and Dumez, 2015). Past research has noted that
the qualitative approach, referred as comprehensive research (Dana and Dumez, 2015),
may help researchers and policy makers better understand entrepreneurship in the context
of its environment (Dana and Dana, 2005). Thus, when doing research, it is necessary to
understand the values and aspirations of cultures and their people before imposing a
policy on them. Therefore to understand the values and aspirations of cultures and their
people, using mail questionnaires, survey or brief interviews cannot be applied in small
business because the methods do not answer the how question (i.e., their narratives,
intentions, the terms of their actions and interactions) holistically (Dana and Dana, 2015).
They only answer the why question. Therefore research on small businesses should adopt
a qualitative approach to address the how rather than using quantitative research which
answers the why question, and might limit research findings, missing out on critical
research questions, consequently, in our study of informal entrepreneurship dynamics. In
the qualitative or comprehensive method, emphasis is on personal observation of
situations, events, individuals, interactions and transactions, and also document analysis.
It emphasises open-ended interviews yielding in-depth and oral testimonies (Dana and
Dana, 2005). Therefore qualitative data includes a solid narrative and direct quotations
from people about their attitudes, beliefs, thoughts, intentions, actions and experiences
(Dana and Dana, 2005; Geertz, 1973).
Compared to the quantitative method, the qualitative method allows the investigator
to understand the environment for entrepreneurship, and also the entrepreneur as an
individual, and ultimately allows understanding of the entrepreneur’s interaction with the
environment. One of the benefits of adopting this approach in research is its flexibility,
which allows for modification and adaptation to the constraints and opportunities, which
the researchers may face in their working environment. In comparison to the quantitative
approach, the qualitative approach gives the researchers the opportunity to formulate each
question based on each individual respondent’s personal experiences and willingness to
answer. Dana and Dana (2005) suggested that in adopting a qualitative approach, the
researcher should be able to use various qualitative aspects involving recording
interactions, verbal and non-verbal communication, attitudes and facial expressions in
order to understand the entrepreneur’s motivations and perception of opportunities and
constraints in a given environment.
In this study, in adopting a qualitative or comprehensive methodology, open-ended
questions, semi-structured face-to-face interviews and an in-depth interview schedule
were used to interact with male and female entrepreneurs to understand policy support of
small businesses and other aspects of micro-enterprises. The open-ended questions
allowed respondents to express their views and opinions on policy support and other key
factors affecting small businesses. The open-ended questions were also directed to the
local authorities as key informants, the Department of Commercial Affairs, and the
economic planner. This was done through an unstructured type of interview in which the
researcher followed a flexible format to allow discretion and wording of questions asked.
The type of data obtained this way allowed for the assessment of policy support for small
businesses. The researcher-based data on the experiences and views of both established
and less established informal sector activities in the study area. In less established
informal sector activities, every household was visited to ascertain whether
micro-enterprise activity occurred at that site or not. Data were collected from every
micro-enterprise activity so located. Matthews and Ross (2010) pointed out that, in
capturing full interviews, audio recording is acceptable to many people, but their
permission to record must be given. Subsequently, we required the consent of the
participants to record their interviews with a digital recorder and they all concurred.
Recording or transcript of the voices of the respondent was made verbatim during
interviews and was hand-written after the survey. The transcript phase lasted for a month.
During the scheduled interviews, the researcher was a participant observer. Past research
(Dana and Dana, 2005) encouraged the use of this technique in entrepreneurial studies
because it is an ideal means of grasping an understanding of entrepreneurship and its
social context, which allows the research to interact with its players, observing and
recording their respective behaviours while immersed in the same host environment in
which the entrepreneur functions.
In our study, the documentary analysis excluded quantitative records but rather
focused on regulations, legislative framework and guidelines. The review of the policy
framework such as the Township council (Hawking and Street-vending) regulations of
2002, allowed identification of inadequacies of policies in Botswana.
10 Data analysis
We subjected the interview transcripts to thorough analysis using a thematic approach.

Braun and Clarke (2006) defined thematic analysis as “a method for identifying,
analyzing and reporting patterns (themes) within data.” Grbich (2007) also noted that it is
a process of segmentation, categorisation, and rethinking of aspects of the qualitative
transcript data prior to the final interpretation (Grbich, 2007). As noted by Matthews and
Ross (2010), working with collective data mainly involves interpreting and obtaining a
good understanding of the words, stories, accounts, and explanations of the research
respondents. In this regard, we started with each respondent’s words and put them
alongside the words of other respondents to enable us to describe the data and explore
them for meanings. All the interview transcripts were analysed to unravel the emerging
themes and sub-themes. In this process, the responses of both male and female
entrepreneurs, and the key informants, were analysed through non-numerical examination
and interpretation of field results and narratives of entrepreneurs. This analysis was done
to discover the views and perceptions of male and female entrepreneurs in the informal
sector. It was also done to capture the differences and similarities that existed between
male-and female-owned enterprises to understand their specific needs. Furthermore,
qualitative data from both central and local authorities was used to compare and contrast
the relationships that existed between the perceptions of the entrepreneurs and policy
support with regards to the operation of informal sector activities.
11 Survey findings
11.1 Gendered micro-enterprise and regulations, legislative frameworks and

guidelines
The first set of results was on the influence of regulations, legislative frameworks and
guidelines on growth rates and performance of micro-enterprises. Field research
investigations demonstrated that consistent policy support has a strong influence on the
survival and growth of micro-enterprises in developing countries. Legislative frameworks
also explain the guidelines and procedures for the operation of micro-businesses or
informal businesses in the country. In accordance with the regulations, legislative
frameworks and guidelines, micro-enterprise activities were meant to curb the
ever-increasing unemployment amongst males and females in the country in general and
cities in particular. This picture was consistent with previous research findings which
pointed out that the informal sector has become the main source and income generating
activity for the majority of people residing in the developing countries (ILO, 1995, 2002;
Fried, 1998; University of Dar es Slaam Entrepreneurship Centre, UDEC, 2002). In
accordance with the bye-law statutory instrument of 2002, to qualify for an operational
certificate, the applicant has to satisfy the following eligibility criteria:
1 citizen of Botswana
2 attained the age of 16
3 unemployed
4 provide passport photographs
5 provide certified proof or copy of Omang
6 complete an application form
7 state class of goods to be traded
8 state areas to which he wishes to trade (Republic of Botswana, 2002).
Oddly, the eligibility criteria contradicted the actual situation on the ground because there
were disparities between males and females in terms of operational space and choice of
micro-enterprises; micro-enterprises owned by females were predominantly makeshifts
on footpaths while male-owned micro-enterprises were dominant in open spaces in the
market. As such there was a clear indication that the eligibility criteria therefore excluded
a gender sensitive approach to include the less-privileged and disadvantaged populations
in the society (women inclusive). Consequently, female-owned micro-enterprise activities
were limited in commercial areas compared to male-owned micro-enterprises, limiting
the growth rate of female-owned micro-enterprises. It was immediately clear why
female-owned micro-enterprise activities had lower growth rates than male-owned
micro-enterprise; one possible explanation might involve harassment by government
authorities in makeshifts and footpaths, where female-owned micro-enterprises were
predominant. When awarding urban-based hawkers’ licenses, gender stereotypes were
not considered by the relevant department, Department of Commercial Affairs; less
consideration was taken into account on the fact that males and females entered into
micro-enterprise activities with different needs and priorities. This provided some
evidence on the existence of loopholes in the regulations, legislative frameworks and
guidelines. Furthermore, this provided evidence of inconsistent regulation, legislative
frameworks and guidelines on micro-enterprise economic activity. This contention is
supported by Spain (1992), who noted that males’ and females’ segregation in space
reduces the ways in which females access knowledge and as such this forces them into a
lower status relative to males in micro-enterprising activities.
11.2 Start-up issues of male-and-female-owned micro businesses

The first aspect of the semi-face-to-face in-depth interviewing approach was the start-up
capital for male and female-owned micro-enterprises and how these funds were sourced.
The entrepreneurs revealed that they started their businesses through their personal
savings (self) and they passed through difficult stages to raise the start-up capital. To
buttress this claim, a female entrepreneur involved in manufacturing and production
micro-enterprise (e.g., tailoring services) commented that:
“I found it difficult to raise capital for this small business. It was very difficult
for me. For three years I have been saving the smaller amount of money I was
getting from the casual work I was doing.”
Only a few obtained funds from what they termed ‘take it forever’ or as payback loans in
the form of assistance from friends and family. To be specific, female and male
entrepreneurs reported that they used personal savings to set up their micro-enterprise
activities. Other male and female entrepreneurs obtained their funds through
‘micro-credit lenders’ and another female entrepreneur indicated that she raised start-up
capital through contributions from family members.
Entrepreneurs who sourced funds through social networks or crowd funding in the
neighbourhood, called ‘motshelo’ (usually a group of people coming together and
contributing money monthly or getting money from financing institutions for provision of
loans to the group members), also told us how they went about it. For instance, one of the
interviewees, who owned a kiosk, shared her experience:
“I started this business with a small loan from our ‘motshelo’ and after some
time I paid back all the money I collected …’. ‘Motshelo’ is a form of
contribution from a group of friends or members of the neighborhood who
normally keep contributions as a trust. Hence, I approached them and they gave
me the loan at an interest rate of 10% per year. This is what I used to get the
micro-enterprise started.”
Another female entrepreneur who sold food on the street also raised funds to commence
her micro-enterprise through ‘motshelo’. However, her justification of ‘motshelo’
appeared to be different from that of the other respondent. She explained that:
“I got some money from the ‘motshelo’ in this neighborhood as a loan to
kick-start a micro-enterprise without any interest. What I mean by ‘motshelo’ is
a contribution arrangement of a specific amount of money every month by
between 3 to 30 people. The one I did was with 15 people. Then we agreed and
negotiated for a position, which is the period that everybody will collect his or
her contribution. So as I collected mine, I bought some products such as maize
meal, flour, rice, cooking utensils, shade and also drinks. That’s how I started.”
This concept of ‘motshelo’ as an indigenous source of neighbourhood funds embedded in
the society for the purpose of providing loans to members of the society, with possibly
two or more variants in its structure, represented a novel way of assisting friends to get
micro-enterprise ventures off the ground. This was in contrast with much existing
literature that we reviewed where we could not find other comparable example(s). During
our interaction with the participants, we tried to find the reasons they chose the sources to
raise funds for the start-up of their micro-enterprises. Although we expected them to have
approached financial institutions (micro-lenders) and government agencies such as
CEDA, National Development Bank (NDB) for loans, female respondents actually said
that they did not even think of that because they did not have the confidence that financial
institutions could grant them loans given that they had nothing to give as security. A few
of them said that they had approached LEA for some assistance on possible sources of
financial support, and some of them had actually approached micro-credit lenders, but the
conditions attached to grant individuals loans were daunting. Therefore, in the end, they
did not receive any loans. Our finding revealed that only one of the female respondents
met with the staff from CEDA for financial assistance to commence micro-enterprise and
only two participants approached the staff of micro-credit lenders for loans.
One of those who immediately opted to start his business from personal savings
reported that:
“From the first day I thought of this micro-enterprise activity, I started saving
from the little money I got from the Gaborone City Council in a sub-contracted
cleaning company. I didn’t think of another source because the money I was
saving was what I was sure of.”
The respondents were afraid of disappointment from the micro-credit lenders and
commercial banks and just felt safer saving gradually to start their businesses. One of
them commented that:
“I know about the existence of some banks that give out loans for small
business development, but I didn’t want to visit them because I know I won’t
be successful in securing a loan and I won’t be able to pay them back.”
The female entrepreneur who approached CEDA also shared her experience. She
lamented that:
“No government or private sector has given me any funding. I have reached
one commercial bank once and the procedure was a very long one. In the end I
got discouraged. Apart from personal saving, I haven’t received any financial
assistance from micro-credit lenders or other government agencies. When I
tried getting a loan from a micro-credit lender in Gaborone to support the
structure of my kiosk, they asked for security and I didn’t have anything to
give, so I was unable to meet the conditions attached to granting their loans for
micro enterprises.”
In addition, a manufacturing and production male entrepreneur narrated his ordeal with a
micro-credit lender and remarked:
“Initially when I thought of my business I didn’t have capital, I visited a
micro-credit lender, Letshego Financial Services to be specific, and they said
they can only give me a loan if I have an account with them that has been
running for three months. At that time, I was struggling to survive to provide
for my family and I had no money to open any account. So I could not access
their micro loans. I think there is a need for a review of this policy to help us
access financial resources for start-up. It’s not for the less privileged groups.”
When the entrepreneurs were asked to give an account of the challenges they faced in
starting their businesses, virtually all of them had some complaints. This led to the
emergence of some themes in Box 1.
Table 1 Box 1
Box 1
• Lack of operational spaces or premises and completion for operational space
• Lack of micro-credit
• Limited equipment
• Excessive government regulations and guidelines
• Inexperience and an insufficient support system
11.3 Inefficient support system

A majority of the male and female entrepreneurs revealed to us that there was an
inefficient support system during start-up, and there were no regular training and capacity
building programs to help run and grow their micro-enterprises. This was a serious
impediment to the micro-entrepreneurs. In this regard, a member of a sewing business
remarked:
“The main challenge I faced when starting my business here is lack of training
and capacity programs, because I learnt how to sew by observing my friend and
that’s how I started my own sewing business to earn money for my family. I
discovered that after starting up, my management skills and financial literacy
was somewhat limited to venture into a profitable business and win better
tenders from the government, by the time wedding events are over here, many
corporate entities are not willing to have us as suppliers for their uniform.”
Interestingly, a study by Craft and Industry Promotion/Small Enterprise Development
(CIP/SED, 1999) indicated that females serve brief apprenticeships from their mothers
and as such were often semi-skilled rather than skilled entrepreneurs compared to their
male counterparts. This has in turn hindered females to compete on an equal basis with
males (Fischer et al., 1993; International Fund for Agricultural Development, IFAD
2000). Another member of a sewing micro-enterprise activity expressed her concern
about the inefficient support system in micro-enterprising. She stated that:
“Starting a business without a proper training was stressful. Although I have

skills for sewing, I needed empowerment, book-keeping skills and training on
business ethics and financing to expand it.”
In short, while there was a potential for job creation by the informal sector, until there is
more training programs, financial literacy, sustainable and efficient empowerment and
capacity building programs and resources that drives growth, placing limitations on the
day-to-day operations of male and female entrepreneurs in this sector in Botswana.
12 Rationale for venturing into micro-enterprising activities
12.1 Financial support

With regards to the rationale of venturing into a micro-enterprise activity, most of the
respondents indicated that it was financial support and sustenance. This finding was
similar to previous studies on the rationale for venturing into micro-enterprises in
developing countries with a higher incidence of unemployment. For instance, one of the
respondents remarked:
“I started selling airtime and clothes when I finished my Cambridge since I had
nothing to do and needed to work to help raise money for myself and to support
my family … The business is solely for profit purposes.”
Concerning the motives for starting entrepreneurship, Anggadwita et al. (2015) found
that the motivation for females in entrepreneurship was initially because of economic
necessity, to earn huge profits and freedom and control in the decision-making process.
Anggadwita et al (2017) noted that in Indonesia, the motive of females to start
entrepreneurship was to satisfy personal interests such as profit gathering, recognition,
social status and a desire to have their own businesses rather than working for others in
companies, reducing the level of unemployment and improving the welfare of the
community. A related view regarding the rationale for setting up a micro-enterprise
activity in our study was also given by a female entrepreneur as she expressed that:
“The reason for setting up this micro-enterprise was to supplement my income
to help myself and my family and to further pay bills, and other necessities of
life.”
Financial support was the key rationale for male and female entrepreneurs as they
experienced unprecedented unemployment. To this end, a respondent commented that:
“I saw it as an opportunity to be self-employed and I started it as way to
provide income for myself and my family, since there were no signs of getting
employment and there are no companies here to give me employment.”
Similarly, another respondent stated that:
“Airtime sells very well in almost all the places. As a result, I raised money to
start this business as I didn’t have a job then. Today I have created a job for
myself and I am feeding and supporting my family well.”
These statements emphasised the importance of micro-enterprises. The main similarities
were three-fold as indicated in Box 2:
Table 2 Box 2
Box 2: Similarities of male-owned and female-owned micro-enterprises

• No private sector involvement
• Start-up capital came from individual savings and their own family and friends rather
than an outsider agency with formal grants and/or soft loans which are usually accessed
through formal submissions/applications
• No local entrepreneurial innovation or formal agency providing professional business
advice
12.2 Reduce the poverty situation and inconvenience

In interviews we held with the participants, a female entrepreneur revealed to us that she
started her business to help alleviate the impoverished situation of her family. In addition,
she told us that in the process of helping her family, she also generated income for
payment of bills. This is consistent with similar findings by Anggadwita et al. (2017),
who indicated that females in entrepreneurship are motivated by a chance to meet the
economic needs of their families. As a matter of fact, one of the female entrepreneurs of a
makeshift business located on the footpath of Marang Street expressed her views on the
key rationale for starting her micro-enterprise and commented that:
“What actually motivated me to start selling sweets, airtime vouchers and
others here was to help my family to get money for their daily needs and also
reduce the cost of people going to BBS mall to put credit on their phones. Like
some of my people in the neighborhood cannot afford to walk that distance and
it means they have to take a mini-bus, which will cost about 2.50 pula (USD$
0.25). Consequently, setting up this microenterprise is to reduce their
inconveniences and through this, I make profit from the business.”
12.3 Sustain family income and convenience

A significant number (40) of male and female entrepreneurs revealed that they started
micro-enterprises to sustain family income. One respondent stated that:
“I started this micro-enterprise to sustain and boost income of the family.”
Another respondent also decided to start a micro-enterprise for a similar reason, as he
reported that:
“When I started this business of selling food on the street, it was meant to
reduce the inconvenience of the community members in the neighbourhood.
But today we enjoy the patronage of the people of the neighborhood and it
provides income for our family. So I’m able to sustain my family income.”
12.4 Growth of micro-enterprise activities

One of the important aspects was to do with the influence of location on the growth rate
and performance of micro-enterprise activities. Elizbarashvili (n.d.) demonstrated that
location has a strong influence on the progress and growth of any business. Location also
explained differences in the growth rates of micro-enterprise activities. For male and
female entrepreneurs, micro-enterprises located in the open spaces at the market and open
spaces on the street expanded more rapidly than home-based enterprises (usually
confined to the home), perhaps indicating that access to customers gave a significant edge
to these activities. Female-owned micro-enterprise activities in temporary areas (i.e.,
makeshift, footpath, home, etc.) had a lower growth rate than in the markets. It was
immediately clear that these females had limited freedom in choosing the location of their
business because they hesitated to expose themselves to public spaces and they believed
that their primary roles were in the family sphere, leaving the public activity spaces to
males. One possible explanation might involve the location of female-owned enterprise in
the home because it offered opportunities to perform domestic chores and to work longer
hours, and work during weekends. In addition, household responsibilities performed by
female entrepreneurs highlighted the roles that society expected females to perform
compared to their male counterparts. As such, male entrepreneurs might invest more to
develop and grow their micro-enterprises compared to their female counterparts. This
provided some evidence on the existence of disparities in the choice and growth of
male-and-female-owned micro-enterprise activities. Differences between female-owned
and male-owned micro-enterprise activities included provision of basic infrastructure and
size of the micro-enterprise activity and products sold. In this context, it was
inconceivable that female-owned micro-enterprises would thrive in micro-enterprising
activity.
There were some indications of the importance of source of start-up capital in the
growth of micro-enterprise activities; the degree at which the micro-enterprise economic
activity became considerable. For female-owned and male-owned micro-enterprise,
entrepreneurs experienced different start-up problems, indicating a positive relationship
between growth and progress in similar activities. Female entrepreneurs operated their
micro-enterprises at least without prior skills more rapidly compared to their male
counterparts, with male entrepreneurs being more focused vendors, perhaps indicating
that experience gained in other businesses was useful. Although female-owned
micro-enterprises grew more slowly than those owned by males, female entrepreneurs
tended to be more cautious managers. Other measures of source of start-up capital,
training, and education also provided some insights into the growth and progress of
micro-enterprise. Meanwhile, entrepreneurs who have had formal employment prior to
setting up micro-enterprise, skills, and training grew faster than those of untrained
entrepreneurs, and training had a marginally significant positive impact for male-owned
entrepreneurs compared to their female counterparts. Male entrepreneurs who had
secondary school operated faster-growing micro-enterprises than those female
entrepreneurs with no schooling. These results were consistent with previous studies
which indicated that females enter business with fewer skills and as such limit their
ability to diversify into lucrative business ventures compared to males (Mayoux, 2001;
Elizbarashvili, n.d.; ILO, 2004). The results regarding the socio-economic characteristics
of male-and-female entrepreneurs were more mixed.
12.5 Household decision-making profiles

Past research has noted that the decision-making process concerning succession issues for
family businesses is essential as it affects long-term performance and sustainability
(Ramadani et al., 2017). In Botswana, the majority of families are patriarchal, with males
having more influence than females in the family decision-making process (Maundeni,
2001). Although female-headed households are very important to Botswana, family
relationships are mostly guided by a strict system of male-oriented values where males
tend to dominate in decision-making. In common with many tribes in Botswana, for

example, the issue of decision-making concerning household issues is based on
patriarchy and the involvement of extended family members, guided by male elders. In
order to understand the dynamics of the society, this paper looked at household
decision-making in establishing and operating the micro-enterprises. While this has
yielded some interesting insights into the household decision-making factors contributing
to start-up or establish micro-enterprises and to the growth of micro-enterprises, it has
made it difficult to understand whether there was a higher possibility that family structure
played a decisive role in the establishment of the micro-enterprise in the study area.
While on the surface, female and male-owned micro-enterprises seemed to be remarkably
similar in terms of product type and quality, location, and operation, the
micro-enterprises under consideration here represented markedly different environments.
The household decision-making profiles differed greatly due to cultural and historical
contexts. There were also obvious differences in the providers of main ideas for setting
up the micro-enterprises in order to generate household income, including the type of
economic activity and its sustainability and significant differences in negotiations in the
household. Thus, the existence of a male as household decision maker had been a key
indicator for determining the location of micro-enterprise. This was clarified by a female
respondent, who stated that:
“In October 1998, I was retrenched from my job as cleaner. I was then expected
to cook, wash and take care of the family. My husband was getting lower
salary. He wanted us to start an enterprise to supplement household income. He
told me to apply for a license from the city council. I managed to get the license
from the city council. My husband then told me that we should sell airtime
voucher cards, sweets and bread and use the location in front of the home for
the enterprise. I was very supportive to my husband on this idea. He told me
that I can also perform other household chores.”
This emphasised the outcome of the cultural values, where males have control over
household decisions on the types of inputs into the micro-enterprise, further giving
male-headed households powers over females. This showed that in male-headed
households, females were at a distinct disadvantage in terms of economic influence
because of their limited participation in household decisions on the type of inputs into the
micro-enterprise compared to single females. Therefore, in order to succeed in the
development of micro-enterprises, it is critical for policy-makers to empower and
sensitise disadvantaged groups about business advice to meet socio-economic needs
without negative impacts, fostering a gendered entrepreneurial climate, diversification of
the local economy, and encouragement of females in entrepreneurship. These outcomes
may also be critical to the various stages of micro-enterprise activities insofar as the
growth rate and long-term performance is concerned.
12.6 Perceived future prospects for micro-enterprising

Commitment in any business as a source of livelihood is a critical aspect for its growth
and progress, and the issue of commitment needs to be seen in the context of the future
plans for the enterprises to continue operations in the long run. Regarding long-term
intentions or motives of male and female entrepreneurs, the excerpts from our interviews
with the entrepreneurs indicated that the majority of them appeared to be optimistic that
their businesses would grow. This is based on the diversity of products and services they
would offer. Our findings showed that more male entrepreneurs had future plans about
growth and consolidation of the micro-enterprises than female entrepreneurs. Moreover,
our findings also found that the majority of male entrepreneurs were concerned about
increasing social networks with other micro-enterprises. This implied that male-owned
micro-enterprises had more progressive ambitions than female-owned micro-enterprises.
The long-term intentions or motives of male and female entrepreneurs are presented
under the following themes:
12.6.1 Survivalist
This was evident among the majority of male and female-owned micro-enterprises.
Survivalist means that the entrepreneur operates the business to sustain the family
without any future plans to grow it (Ministry of Trade and Industry, MTI, 2003). The
survey found that more female-owned micro-enterprises than male-owned
micro-enterprises were survivalist. As one female entrepreneur stated:
“I’ve been selling jewelry from home; I then changed to pay phone operation
because profits were marginal. I get to meet lots of customers and fit my other
family commitments and address my household responsibilities.”
Here is another response from an interviewee with regards to survivalist:
“Well, I have started a small business to sustain family income, but I had no
confidence on whether to expand it or not. But at the moment, the family is
benefiting and profit is promising.”
12.6.2 Consolidation and growth

Male entrepreneurs mentioned that they would have appreciated to expand and diversify
their businesses, apart from the fact that the council was slow in giving out licenses and
stalls, and they faced some financial difficulties, making the business unreliable. In view
of this, one male entrepreneur located within the household commented that:
“This micro-enterprise is good. My problem with it is that it is located inside
the yard, which is characterised by low profits. Like in the evening, we do not
get sufficient support; we only enjoy much business during the day and when
people go for holidays.”
It is important to note that the availability of operational space in micro-enterprising was
an influencing factor for growth and progress of the business. It was also evident that this
was an important aspect in diversifying the business. This notion was also reflected in the
expression of the male entrepreneur of a brick moulding business, who commented that:
“I need a bigger and more spacious location for this business because it is
helping me to support my family with income and employment of unskilled
labour, and honestly it’s a business that we can rely on because people are
building new houses, making it a sustainable business when a spacious place is
allocated to me and ask my friend to join me in this business and make it bigger
than now.”
13 Discussion
Evidently, from our investigation, the establishment of the micro-enterprises was for
economic growth and employment creation. In our literature review of micro-enterprises
we had seen limited reference to the analysis of female-and male-owned
micro-enterprises to explain the sort of situation that we had investigated in Botswana.
Thus, our findings extended the inclusion of the voices of entrepreneurs to understand the
entrepreneurial situation faced by female and male entrepreneurs as it was evident that it
was an important sector with regards to employment creation and economic growth in the
local communities in developing countries, including Botswana.
The main sources of start-up capital of micro-entrepreneurship activity in this study
were personal savings, borrowing from family members and friends, and crowd
funding – ‘motshelo’. The particular phenomenon of ‘motshelo’ as a social source of
community funding in society – a small group of social or peer members who contributed
funds to a central pool from which loans were made to other members of the group – was
a concept that appeared to be novel in the context of analysing micro-enterprising activity
in our study. We could not find references to similar informal group contribution in our
literature review of micro-entrepreneurship. Other studies, by Butale (2001) and Joseph
(2003) reported that the most important source of financial support for micro-enterprises
was usually the owners’ personal savings rather than sources such as micro-lenders and
banks, referring to formally registered banking establishments mandated with the goal of
providing micro-lending services.
The majority of male and female entrepreneurs had a negative perception of such
recognised financial establishments, choosing not to approach them, and this negativity
helped to explain the limited knowledge of the activities of micro-lenders and other
financial institutions mandated with the responsibility of supporting the development of
micro-enterprises among members of society in the country. Furthermore, this study
showed that the fewer micro-entrepreneurs who took time to seek financial assistance
from micro-lenders could not secure any as a result of the unfavourable conditions
attached. This finding was in agreement with Ntseane (2004), which also reported that
small business owners in the manufacturing and service sectors in lesser developed and
developing countries found it difficult to obtain financial assistance in the form of
micro-loans, thereby making them endure difficult times of raising funds from personal
savings and borrowing from friends and families. This suggested that the financial
difficulties faced by micro-entrepreneurs in developing countries were peculiar to all the
sectors of the economy. It also provided the general belief that for micro-enterprises in
Botswana, access to start-up capital was mainly through personal savings, loans from
friends and family support, and this pointed to the failure of micro-credit schemes in the
country (Mosotho, 2003).
With regards to the rationale for the start-up of micro-enterprises, our findings
showed that the majority ventured into business to generate income and to improve
family livelihoods. This finding was similar to micro enterprise owners in Malaysia
(Jamak et al., 2014), Indonesia (Singh et al., 2000), and Pakistan (Coy et al., 2007).
Research has shown that females are increasingly interested in entrepreneurship in order
on improve the economy of the family, female independence, and self actualisation,
which in turn will help to improve the economies of the countries (Anggadwita et al.,
2015). In other words, entrepreneurs in developing countries would be motivated to
venture into micro-enterprise to make profit to provide for the daily needs of their
families, who are unemployed. Apart from previous studies of micro-enterprises which
our study findings supported, it was also consistent with the findings of investigations on
micro-enterprises in lesser developed and developing countries. They have established
that males and females kick started their micro-enterprises in order to generate income
and sustain their living standard and raise themselves from poverty (Parker, 1995).
Regarding research on the influence of household decision-making on start-up, this
was somewhat limited, though it showed the importance of household decision-making in
this traditionally patriarchal-oriented society. Embedded in the role of marriage was the
importance attributed to how decisions were made in the household. The predominance
of females as heads of household, owning and operating micro-enterprises was a major
divergence from the traditional societal values where females now played critical roles in
the establishment of micro-enterprise. On the contrary, where males were heads of
households as reflected in our study, they dominated household decision-making on what
products and types of micro-enterprise to venture, which was a reflection of traditional
gender roles in the wider African context, in which males are still deemed providers of
the family. This highlighted household decision-making dynamics that existed in
male-headed micro-enterprises, where family acted as an exchange of ideas to start-up an
enterprise to sustain the livelihoods of the household. This is because in patriarchal
society females are most of the time caregivers for children and are excluded from
household decision-making processes. Consequently, females facilitate their husbands’
entrepreneurial aspirations. This decision-making dynamics, therefore, means that there is
an urgent need to look into ways of providing favourable conditions for female-headed
households in general and female entrepreneurs in particular to gain access to sustainable
micro-enterprise because the exclusion of females from the crucial decisions might
compromise their participation in the micro-enterprise sector.
On the future prospects for micro-enterprising, our findings showed that the majority
of the male and female entrepreneurs would like to grow their businesses and have
excellent networks, but lacked business acumen and networks, opportunities for relevant
work experience and a plan to grow them, and a somewhat nonchalant attitude. It is
similar to studies on micro business expansion in the African continent and Malaysia
(Jamak et al., 2014). This situation is different from developed countries where
micro-enterprise owners have prior experience and higher education when in start-ups.
Importantly, more male entrepreneurs than female entrepreneurs believed that their
business would consolidate and grow, by learning from formal networks such as
suppliers and retailers. This connoted that males appeared to be taking the consolidation
and growth of their business seriously so that when they are allocated operational space,
growth from micro-enterprises to large scale enterprises would be guaranteed, and with
proper facilities in place, a complete structured marketing and packaging strategy. This
attitude was limited to male-owned micro-enterprises; male-owned enterprises were
profit-oriented while female-owned enterprises were more survival-oriented. This was
consistent with other studies in developing countries, which have found that male
entrepreneurs appeared to be more positive about growth of their business because of the
degree of their start-up capital, prior skills and higher levels of education (Goldmark and
Nicher, 2009). In addition, male entrepreneurs use profitability and expansion in size to
assess their business success while females put more emphasis on family-related matters
and opting to diversify by creating additional microenterprise (Nchimbi, 2002; Van Elk,
1996).
14 Conclusions
Using a qualitative or comprehensive approach to explain male-owned and female-owned

micro-enterprises, in Gaborone, Botswana, was a novel analysis we believe contributed to
a more comprehensive understanding of their operations and challenges. Throughout our
investigation, it appeared that male and female-owned micro-enterprise activities in
developing countries had similar operational characteristics. They are faced with similar
challenges during start-up and similar issues in sustaining their businesses. At the start-up
phase of microenterprises, there seemed to be persistent cases of insufficient financial
resources and start-up capital, making female and male entrepreneurs experiencing
difficulties raising funds from personal savings, loans from friends and family members.
Even with the existence of the novel social network or crowd-funding gestures such as
‘motshelo’ discovered by this study, in general, difficulties in sourcing start-up capital
was not a healthy situation for female and male entrepreneurs as the continuous
occurrence of this scenario would defeat the overall goal of employment creation to
enhance economic development and empowerment as well as directly influencing the
viability of profitable business opportunities for this group. The situation evident in this
study and other studies on micro-enterprises in lesser developed and developing countries
was worrisome. It has led to entrepreneurs, particularly female entrepreneurs, losing
confidence in the capacity of the policy to support micro-enterprises. Thus, there is an
urgent need for policy-makers to maintain an appropriate awareness of the continued
existence of micro-enterprises owned by less-privileged and vulnerable groups, especially
female entrepreneurs, and integrate their needs and interests in their developmental
proposals, particularly micro-financing the informal sector in addition to initiatives such
as ‘motshelo’.
The development of micro-enterprise activities has been identified as a positive
method of employment creation, economic development and empowerment. Thus,
government should also ensure that adequate regular funds for micro-enterprises are
provided through micro-lenders and loans are provided at very low interest rates that are
affordable to them, and that policy is less excessive. The condition that potential
entrepreneurs who seek micro-loans must have been running an account for at least three
months is not favourable for most the owners of micro-enterprises in developing
countries. There is an urgent need for gender differentiation of micro-sector activity, both
male and female entrepreneurs segregated in the whole process.
It was also established that the household type was related to the decision making
process and patterns of establishment of micro-enterprise in the urban set-up. It is
therefore important that policy-makers should not only look at the contribution of
micro-enterprise to male and female entrepreneurs, but at the power relations within
households. It is particularly important for policy-makers when planning to consider
vulnerability and empowerment for long-term sustainability of male and female-owned
micro-enterprises.
The general concern for growth of micro-enterprises stood out in this study. This
scenario emphasised the level of complexities of operating micro-enterprises in
developing countries because of inadequate policy support, particularly for female-owned
micro-enterprises. This challenge possibly would push most female-owned entrepreneurs
to establish micro-enterprise for the purpose of supporting the family, limiting
opportunities for profitable business activities. Unless government effort is focused on
employment creation and empowerment in which micro-enterprise economic activity is
given the highest priority, the rationale for starting up micro-enterprises in lesser
developed and developing countries would remain a greater challenge. Addressing this
challenge would require concerted efforts by different stakeholders, including gender
groups, decision makers, advocacy groups, the private sector, etc. to ensure that the needs
and interests of males and females are integrated into all policy development, especially
regarding gender, mainstreaming government economic policies and legal reforms. This
means changing terminologies incorporated in the regulatory frameworks and increasing
females’ access to capital through self-sustainable micro-credit programs. This would
possibly enhance the growth and diversity of micro-enterprise, and boost the growth of
micro-enterprises. Perhaps the different stakeholders should create self-empowerment
and self-awareness for both males and females involved in the micro-enterprise sector,
especially in relation to access to operational space. There is also a need to adopt policy
frameworks and structural reforms that are responsive to changing times. For instance,
government-led micro-sector support initiatives should reach both males and females in
time.
In fact, males and females face gender specific barriers in the micro-business sector.
Subsequently, government legislative frameworks and structural reforms that are aimed
at helping the micro-sector should be specifically tailored to encourage and support the
start-up and sustainable growth of the micro-sector and its transition from the informal to
the formal economy for both males and females. An enabling environment should be
enacted to cater to the equal participation of males and females who have the will and
entrepreneurial spirit to engage in the micro-business sector but do not have the means to
do so. While this paper did not represent the final word on the determinants of the growth
of micro-enterprises, the analysis provided some preliminary insights into the dynamics
of male and female-owned micro-enterprises and growth, many of which may be
immediately useful to those who intend to provide assistance and support to
micro-enterprises. A still better understanding of this issue would be highly useful input
into the decision-making processes of governments and support agencies. Consequently,
micro-small enterprise development programs should be clear about their objectives.
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to Emily Lyons for proofreading the paper. We thank all
entrepreneurs for their valuable participation in this study and the anonymous reviewers
for their invaluable suggestions.
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A Gender Analysis of Micro-Entrepreneurship in Developing-Transition Countries Insights From Botswana

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Int. J. Entrepreneurship and Small Business, Vol. 39, No.

A gender analysis of micro-entrepreneurship in

Copyright © 2020 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

Keywords: male-owned micro-enterprise; female-owned micro-enterprises;

Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Mmereki, D.,

Biographical notes: Daniel Mmereki is a part-time international researcher at

Alice Hovorka is a Professor and Director at the School of Environmental

Thando Gwebu was a Professor at the Department of Environmental Sciences,

entrepreneurs based on markets rates. In addition, the Government of Botswana provides

3 Policy regarding small business support in Botswana

4 Comparison between entrepreneurship in Botswana and other countries

As discussed earlier in this article, entrepreneurship has been viewed as contributing to

competition. Regrettably, in most of the developing countries, policy for promoting

5 Entrepreneurship performance and gender-based considerations

6 Data and explanatory variables

In developing countries, including Botswana, fewer studies have been conducted on

Deciding on an apt sampling technique is an essential aspect of social research that

1 concentrate on a very small sample of individual entrepreneurs

9 Qualitative interviewing and recording

We subjected the interview transcripts to thorough analysis using a thematic approach.

11.1 Gendered micro-enterprise and regulations, legislative frameworks and

11.2 Start-up issues of male-and-female-owned micro businesses

11.3 Inefficient support system

“Starting a business without a proper training was stressful. Although I have

12 Rationale for venturing into micro-enterprising activities

12.1 Financial support

Box 2: Similarities of male-owned and female-owned micro-enterprises

12.2 Reduce the poverty situation and inconvenience

12.3 Sustain family income and convenience

12.4 Growth of micro-enterprise activities

12.5 Household decision-making profiles

tend to dominate in decision-making. In common with many tribes in Botswana, for

12.6 Perceived future prospects for micro-enterprising

12.6.2 Consolidation and growth

Using a qualitative or comprehensive approach to explain male-owned and female-owned

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