Female Entrepreneurs in the Informal Sector of ... - Wiley Online Library

In Burkina Faso, most informal sector economic activities in the capital, Ouagadougou, are gender-specific, and the majority of them are for males. Urban women increasingly need incomes too. A growing number of women in Ouagadougou are not maintained by a husband. About a third, 348, are single, not yet married, widowed or divorced. Divorce, which is uncommon in the rural areas, becomes possible for men and women in the capital.’ Also, temporary migration from the urban areas causes many married women to become effectively heads of households; 14% of households are female-headed. Other women have husbands who earn very low incomes or no income at all. However, women’s opportunities remain limited in Burkina Faso. The economic participation of women aged between 15 and 65 in the urban areas is only 37% (LonguC, 1990: 47). Although education for girls is becoming more common, this does not guarantee employment. Already, 20.5% of the urban women have had primary education and 10.8% secondary or higher education (INSD, 1989: 39). But the type of education girls actually receive is not adequate. ‘In urban areas, educated women are more affected by unemployment than men, reflecting a certain inequality of access to employment for men and women’ (ibid.: 246). For example, in the Civil Service, there are five times as many male senior managers and professionals as female (ibid.: 223). Since opportunities in the modem sector will remain small (for men as well as women), it is interesting to investigate why women are less active in the informal sector than men. One of the reasons could be that the range of activities they can execute is limited. This article tries to explain why this is so. It examines why activities are so strictly segregated. Are the reasons primarily economic or are other factors important? And are there ways of broadening the range of activities open to women?

* Hanneke Dijkman works for the Netherlands Development Organisation in Uganda and Meine Pieter Van Dijk for the Faculty of Economics, Erasmus University, Rotterdam, The Netherlands. 1. 2%of all urban women over the age of 12 are divorced, as compared with 1% in the rural areas (INSD, 1989: 124) Development Policy Review Vol. 11 (1993). 273-288 @ Overseas Development Institute 1993. Published by Blackwell Publishers, 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 IJF, UK, and 238 Main Street, Cambridge, MA 02142. USA.

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Definition of the informal sector and methodological issues After many years of controversy about the nature of informality, two characteristics of the informal sector have emerged. The first is size; the second is the extent to which an enterprise manages to avoid official regulations and taxes (Lubell, 1991: 11). For practical reasons we have treated the criterion of the registration of employees with the social security fund as crucial. Enterprises which register their staff with this fund are considered to be in the modem sector. Female activities are defined here as those executed by women, and in which the role of men is negligible. The obverse are male activities. Activities in which both sexes participate are defined as mixed activities. A summary of informal activities in Burkina Faso and of activities included in this survey is given in Table 1.

Table 1 Economic activities in the inf'ormal sector of Ouagadougou' Male Car and motor-cycle repairs, Construction; electrical repairs; upholstery; woodworking; transport: sales of coffee and tea; blacksmithing (including metallic furniture);plumbing; repair of watches; photography; milling; meat trading; shoeshine boys Mixed but predominantly male Tailoring; domestic staff; laundry; shoe mending and tannery; trade of cloth and secondhand clothes; healing; artistic handicrafts Mixed but predominantly female Hairdressing;fruit and vegetables trade; work in hotels and Restaurants; spinning; dyeing; basket making; weaving; trade in groundnuts Female Beer brewing and selling; production and sale of doughnuts, and other edible products Source: LouguC (1990: 62-63), Plan Directeur (1990: 6), Van Dijk and Dijkman, census results. Those covered in our sample are in italics.

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Data used in this article were collected in 1991.2 Earlier research had neglected female entrepreneurs, so we decided to interview equal numbers of women and men. Previous studies had focused mainly on productive activities, particularly those executed by male entrepreneurs, and neglected commercial activities in which women are more active (Plan Directeur, 1990; Van Dijk, 1986). Some had included women as well as men but had no comparison between the two sexes (Carrizo, 1986; ONPE, 1987; Kabore and Soulama, 1991). Some were linked to women’s projects and include no men at all (UN, 1990, 1991; Deslauriers, 1991). The only comparable study in Burkina Faso is a review of the existing literature which presents no new data (LouguC, 1990). We selected not only traditional female activities like beer-brewing, but also activities in which we expected to find some potential, for example, the production and sale of edible products and tailoring. In total, we interviewed 350 entrepreneur^:^ The women worked in female (141) and mixed activities: in tailoring (15), handicrafts, especially weaving (12) and some other nonspecified activities (5). The men worked in all the indicated male activities (124), in tailoring (lo), in handicrafts (12) and in some other mixed (predominantly female) activities (12) and in other non-specified activities (12). All factors limiting women embarking on male activities are checked! First, the access of women to production factors (capital, land, labour and education) and to markets is analysed. Secondly, the social, cultural and political environment for female entrepreneurs is investigated, including the influence of the husband, the distribution of domestic duties and the importance of existing policies. In each case we try to assess whether these factors prevent women from starting male activities. We also examine the situation of male entrepreneurs. How did they start their enterprises? How do they survive? Can women do likewise?

Access to production factors and markets

If women have no access to capital, to work space, to qualified staff and to training and education, they are unable to start any activity. Can women have access to resources that permit them to start a male activity? And if so, can they sell their products? 2. At the request of the World Bank as a follow-up study following surveys of the informal sector in Ouagadougou in 1976 and 1979 (Van Dijk, 1986). This article does not necessarily reflect the point of view of the Bank, however. 3. 7 cases were eliminated, 2 because they were too big in employment terms and 5 because they had started to register some of their employees with the social security institution. 4. The approach is inspired by Elson (1991), Dennis (1991). MacEwen Scott (1991) and Dulansseay and Austin (1984).

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The initial investments of male entrepreneurs are on average higher than those of female entrepreneurs, but our analysis suggests that lack of access to capital is not the main constraint on women starting male activities. First, because the initial investments of female entrepreneurs in some female or mixed activities are quite considerable, higher than those in most male activities. This is the case with female hairdressers, tailors (investment in sewing machines) and women producing yoghurt (who use freezers)? Women undertaking high initial investments rarely have a husband who is a farmer or without a job; like the general run of women, about a third of them do not have a husband. Moreover, some male activities, for instance selling coffee and tea or transporting goods, can be started with very small investments. No significant differences in initial investments could be found for 11 activities, 5 exclusively male (e.g. electric repairs, wood working) and 6 female or mixed (e.g. selling fruit and vegetables, beer-brewing). The fact that both male and female entrepreneurs report changes in location means that neither of them are forced to stay permanently in a particular location; they can choose freely. Hence it is not very likely that location influences the choice of women for certain activities. In the first place, women can own or rent workshops just like men. This applies particularly to female hairdressers and tailors. When female entrepreneurs hire a workshop, they pay the same rent as male entrepreneurs. Secondly, women and men give the same reasons for choosing a particular location. Both mention proximity to their home or clients as well as the fact that she (or herhis family) owns the workplace. The same holds true for women with children. Although it is often argued that children limit female entrepreneurs in their choice of a location, we found that only 20% of the women with more than 4 children worked at home. Female entrepreneurs are more often found working at home, in the open air or under a shelter, while male entrepreneurs more often work in some kind of workshop. This may be explained by the activity. Each activity is normally executed in a specific type of workplace; beer brewers work at home, meals are sold under a shelter or in the open air, woodworkers and metalworkers work in a workshop, etc. We conclude from this that the activity chosen determines the kind of workplace and 'not the other way round. Consequently women are not constrained in their access to work space. This is not a barrier to their embarking on male activities. Access to labour means the possibilities for female entrepreneurs to hire personnel. In order to determine whether women lack access to labour we looked at the staff needed to start an enterprise, the demand for labour on a long-term basis, and the type of labour needed.

5. 97.5% of the male entrepreneurs initially invested more than 100,OOO CFAF. Only 39 female entrepreneurs invested more at the outset. Among these 29 were hairdressers, tailors and women making edible products.


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Lack of access to labour does not seem to be a reason for women to refrain from starting a male activity. Like most men, the majority of women who have recently started an enterprise already have employees.6 It would also be surprising if women were not able to employ the necessary workforce to continue their business. Although total employment is lower in female-headed enterprises, women can and do employ apprentices, employees, family workers and daily labour. It is still possible that women are not able to employ staff with the necessary qualifications, but no data are available on this subject.

Access t o education and training

The majority of women are unable to acquire the skills needed for male activities. We examine first how men acquire knowledge and skills before starting their activity; then we check how women do this. We distinguish six types of education: formal general education, formal professional education, informal training as an apprentice or a family worker and acquiring skills through employment in either the informal or the formal sector. Formal general education is hardly ever a necessary attribute for starting a male activity. Only in car and electric repairs do all the men have some formal general education. As noted earlier, a considerable number of women have received some years of general education. Of the entire urban population of Burkina Faso, 54% of the men and 32% of the women are literate (LouguC, 1990 88). In our sample, these percentages were about the same for men (5 1%) but much higher for women (47%). There were no significant differences in respect of the number of years of formal education, however. So if formal general education was the only prerequisite for launching into car and electric repairs, women could have undertaken this. Formal professional education is rare in Burkina Faso. Of all those working in the urban informal economy, only 6% of the men and 2.4% of the women have some professional training (OWE, 1987: 38). In our sample these percentages were much higher for both sexes. There are no male activities where formal professional education is absolutely necessary. In our sample, men with formal professional education were engaged in most activities, but were concentrated in car repairs, where a third of them had received vocational training. Most men learn their job through informal training as an apprentice. In our sample, 70% of the men had been apprentices; the average period of apprenticeship was almost four years. This kind of training is essential in 6. Of the 58 male entrepreneurs with enterprises of at most one year’s standing, 16 (28%)had no employees. Among the 69 women who had started an enterprise a year or less earlier, 25 (36%)employed no labour.

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tailoring, woodworking and upholstery. All male entrepreneurs in these activities had gained experience as apprentices. Women had been trained as apprentices in only 28% of cases, and on average for a period of not quite three years. Women have less experience as apprentices, either because they do not want this kind of training, or because they are not offered the opportunity to obtain it, Women seem to have no access to apprenticeship in male activities and this is a major obstacle to their embarking on this type of work. More men than women in the urban informal economy are registered as family labourers.’ Girls normally learn domestic skills that can be useful for female activities such as baking doughnuts, preparing edible products, etc. But they cannot acquire the skills needed for male activities. Unfortunately we were not able to check this in our sample, since our questionnaire did not provide such information. However, other sources indicate that women rarely receive training in male activities as unpaid family workers.8 Acquiring skills through employment is possible in both the informal and the formal sectors. Of the male entrepreneurs working in the formal sector, we estimate that about half were able to use the skills they had acquired for their actual activity.’ Male entrepreneurs who have worked in the modem sector are now dispersed over all male activities, apart from tea and coffee selling. A concentration of them is found among entrepreneurs in woodworking and construction and, surprisingly, some of them are restaurant owners, which is a mixed activity. Women, however, are limited in acquiring skills through employment in the formal sector for two reasons. First, they have far less access than men to formal sector employment. This is reflected in our sample, where 17% of the men and only 6.4% of the women had had experience in the formal sector. Secondly, the skills women acquire in the formal sector are irrelevant for work in the informal sector, since most women are employed in secretarial or typing jobs, in the health sector or in education. Only 2 out of 11 women were actually working in the same activity in which they were employed in the formal sector: one as a hairdresser and the other as a female tailor. Skills acquired through employment in the informal sector are not essential for male activities. Only 20% of the men in our sample had been employed by 7. Of the 42,718 males active in the labour force, ONPE (1987: 39) registered 6.7%as family workers, while of the 40,391 active women only 2.7% were working as family workers. 8. The 1985 Census (INSD,1989) registered the active labour force according to activity and employment status (employers, independent workers, wage workers, apprentices, family labour). In male activities, including family labour, hardly any women are active (Lougut 1990: 62-76). 9. From the open-ended questions we discovered that 13 male entrepreneurs were previously employed in a similar activity, 9 in a different activity, and for 6 others the formal sector activity could not be traced back.


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an entrepreneur in the informal sector. There is no male activity, apart from car repairs and tailoring, in which this type of experience is required, although in most activities some entrepreneurs had previously been employees. Fewer women than men in our sample had worked in the informal sector. Since this kind of experience is not essential for men this cannot be a reason for women not to embark on a male activity. The low access of women to employment in the informal sector (just 1 out of 9 women in our sample) is usual for the urban informal sector." The six types of education mentioned above can be regrouped into two categories: training on the job and formal education. First we shall check if women without training on the job are able to enter male activities. Then we investigate if women with neither training on the job nor formal education are able to start a male activity. Finally, we investigate how the next generation of male and female entrepreneurs is created. This could provide us with a view of the future. Women often receive no training on the job, either as apprentices, or as employees in the informal or the modern sector. Only 40% of female entrepreneurs had had such training, as compared with 83% of male entrepreneurs. Activities which are open to male entrepreneurs without any type of training on the job are not the most lucrative ones. These men are concentrated in coffee and tea selling or are transporters. More attractive activities like woodworking, repair of cars and (motor)cycles and upholstery are only open to men with professional training. Considerably more women than men have no training at all, whether on the job or through formal education." Only a few male activities - coffee and tea selling, construction (especially brick making) and transportation (of sand, water or other goods by a simple means of transport) - are open to men with no education. Mixed activities provide the possibility for women to take a first step towards male activities. Of the men working in mixed activities, only 10% had no education. The pattern is quite different for women. Of the women in mixed activities, 42%had had no education or training on the job. Tailoring (a mixed but predominantly male activity) seems to be an interesting exception: all women working in this activity had received some training or education. Table 2 summarises the type of training that men normally receive before entering an activity. From this it can be concluded that, except for brick-making, transportation and selling coffee and tea, female entrepreneurs will need access to on-the-job training or formal education if they want to start a male activity. 10. According to ONPE (1987: 39) 28% of the 4,772 wage workers in the informal sector are female. 11. The difference is significantly lower for female entrepreneurs at the no-training level 37% of women compared to 1 1 % of men.


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Table 2 Type of training common for specific male activities

No +.raining or education

Brick-making, transportation and selling coffee and tea

Informal on-the-job training as an apprentice

All activities

Formal general or professional education

Electrical repairs, woodwork and upholstery

Experience in the modern sector

Edible products, construction, metal working

Experience as an employee in the informal sector

Metal working and electrical repairs

In respect of the next generation of male entrepreneurs, boys get the opportunity to acquire the necessary skills and knowledge, especially as apprentices. But very few entrepreneurs in activities which can be started without any training, employ apprentices. The next generation of female entrepreneurs is probably created mainly through family labour. Female entrepreneurs employ significantly fewer apprentices than male entrepreneurs, but employ more family workers. The type of skills needed for female activities is often closely related to household skills. This may explain why there is less employment by women than by men. Only in new ‘mixed’ activities like hairdressing and tailoring are the education patterns changing for female entrepreneurs. In these two activities all women have some education, either training on the job or formal education. In turn they give on-the-job training to other women. Female tailors, for example, have received formal training in schools or vocational training in special training 12. In our sample 83 male and 28 female entrepreneurs trained apprentices, on average 1.27 versus 0.42 apprentices, a statistically significant difference. Women do, however, employ 0.65 family workers, 0.2 more than men, again significantly different. In total (apprentices, employees, family workers, daily labour and others) men employ 3.21 and women 2.35 people; again significantly different at the 1% level.


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centres.13 The second generation is also trained by female tailors, and these entrepreneurs sometimes receive money from the apprentices they train. In this way, a new form of training on the job for women seems to be emerging.14 We conclude therefore that for most male activities some kind of formal education or training on the job is needed. Probably it is difficult for women to get such training from male entrepreneurs in the informal sector, since people are used to employing boys or young men as apprentices, family workers or wage workers. Access of women to on-the-job training in the formal sector is also limited both in numbers and as far as the relevance of the skills is concerned. Only through formal professional education do women seem to have an opening to certain mixed activities like tailoring and hairdressing.

Access to markets

Do women wanting to start a male activity have access to the same markets as male entrepreneurs? We distinguish selling mainly to the public from selling mainly to others, such as government services, and modem or informal sector enterprises. In some male activities (e.g. male tailors) the entrepreneurs sell regularly to female clients, but most products of male activities are sold exclusively to male customers. Firstly, because it is probably men who decide on the purchase of durable consumer goods such as houses (construction sector and metal producers) and furniture (woodworkers and upholstery). Secondly, because men are usually the owners of consumer goods such as cars, (motor)cycles, TV sets and radios, which need maintenance and repair. Finally, some products are typically consumed only by men, for example tea and coffee served with buttered bread at outdoor tables. Whether women embarking on a male activity are likely to find customers is hard to predict. Women are used to male customers for products like beer, doughnuts and other edible products, so they may be able to sell other products to male customers. In the case of tailoring - an example of women starting a previously male activity - we found that these women were not able to attract male customers. Male tailors can have both male and female customers: but 13. Formal training in schools is provided, for instance by the Collbge d’Enseignement Technique et Ftminin in Ouagadougou, and girls can turn to the ‘Ecole mtnage’ of St. Camille, for instance, for vocational training in special training centres. 14. According to one entrepreneur in our sample, her apprentices could pay up to 50,000 CFAF a year to be trained. Another mentioned the amount of 1,000 CFAF per month. Others are not paid by their apprentices at all. Since we did not expect to find this kind of apprenticeship, no systematic information was collected on it.

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most female tailors sell exclusively to female customer^.'^ Female entrepreneurs could try to focus on female customers. However, women in Ouagadougou have little purchasing power, firstly because of their lower participation in the labour force,I6 and secondly, because they tend to spend their income on food for their family, or on the education and health of their children, according to data on the province of Kadiogo (Kabor6, 1991: 42). If sales to other clients were to become important, women would probably find this an obstacle. On the one hand, female-headed enterprises on average have fewer different types of clients17 and sell less often to (small and big) traders and modem sector enterprises than male entrepreneurs. On the other hand, women could probably find outlets for their goods and services, since they actually have just as many tourists, foreigners, government organisations and ‘others’ as clients as male entrepreneurs. The data therefore suggest that women not only have problems in attracting male customers but that they also have difficulty in attracting small and big traders and modem sector enterprises as their clients.

Social, cultural and family factors To what extent do social, cultural and political factors hinder female entrepreneurs from starting male activities? If women want to start a male activity, they need access to production factors and to markets. As we have seen, their access to capital, to work space and to personnel does not seem to be a serious problem. However, access to the specific knowledge and skills needed for male activities seems to be monopolised by male entrepreneurs. The only way women can get access to this is probably by formal education. Female tailors who acquired their skills by attending formal (professional)education are a good example of how women can circumvent the barriers to apprenticeship in male-headed enterprises. At present a new generation of female tailors is developing its own apprenticeship system. Women in male activities should look for markets where female customers spend money. Since male entrepreneurs are specialised in attracting male customers, female entrepreneurs may have problems in attracting clients. Membership of a particular sex, caste or ethnic group, in a specific cultural context, influences entrepreneurs’ choice of certain activities. Some 15. Of the 10 male tailors in our sample, 4 worked only for male customers, 2 only for female customers, 1 for both, and data for the other 3 were missing. Of the 15 female tailors, 12 worked only for female customers, for the other 3 data were missing. 16. In Ouagadougou, 30%of the women are economically active (LouguC, 1990). In BoboDioulasso the percentage is even lower: 22% (INSD, 1989: 42). 17. The difference is significant but not startling: 2 types for men. 1.75 for women.


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developments in the informal sector indicate, however, that female entrepreneurs can nowadays choose activities which were previously not female activities, or which did not generate income. First, some activities which were previously exclusively male are now mixed. This is notably the case for tailoring. In the countryside, it used to be, and still is, considered a male activity; in the urban areas, women have gained access to this activity through training. A similar change is seen in the case of cloth dyeing. Secondly, services which were previously provided free, are more and more being sold by women. Hairdressing is currently done on a professional basis by more than 1,500 women. It used to be provided free, but women recognised and seized the opportunity to make this activity a commercial one. A third indication that women can now opt to carry out activities from which they were previously excluded, is that they are not completely absent from male activities. Some women are found in upholstery, plumbing, electrical and other repair services. Although their number does not exceed a few dozen, it does indicate that there are possibilities. Finally, women embarking on new activities provide evidence that cultural factors are changing. Fruit and vegetables are only recently available on a large scale in the markets of Ouagadougou. However, the women have managed to take control of almost the entire market, with no strong reaction from male entrepreneurs. Cultural factors do not seem to have a permanent character. They can change and are actually changing. This is important, since it means that policy-makers can consider all economic activities if they want to enhance the participation of women in the informal sector.

The influence of the husband

The majority of women are not influenced by their husbands in the choice and execution of their economic activity. Some women do not have a husband; others are married but the husband cannot provide the desired financial support or he does not want to interfere with his wife’s work.I8 At the time of our interviews, 30% of the female entrepreneurs in our sample were not married; they were either widows, divorced or single. Among this group the widows often have a restaurant or sell fruit and vegetables, while the single women often choose hairdressing or tailoring. The data of our sample roughly correspond with the national census of 1985. As already noted 14% of urban households in Burkina Faso are female-headed, with a household consisting on average of 4.4 persons (including the head). 18. Only 31% of the women who responded to this question reported any influence of their husband on their activity.

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Single women account for 34% of all women in Ouagadougou. In the urban areas they are more often economically active than married women.” This can be because, since they have an income, there is no financial need to marry, but working can also be a necessity for women, whether unmarried, divorced or widowed no matter how little income it brings in, and how much hardship it demands. Of the married women in our sample, several were not influenced by their husbands, the main reason probably being that these husbands were not able to provide sufficient financial support for their families. About 9% reported that their husbands were unemployed, ill or handicapped, which diminished their possible influence because ‘c’est ce meme travail qui le nourit’. Another 10% had a husband who was a farmer; they reported that he had little influence on their activity. The influence of the husband corresponds to the type of marriage (monogamous or polygamous) and the activity of the female entrepreneur, while the economic sector in which the husband works does not seem to have any impact. Women in polygamous marriages are more free than women who do not share their husbands. Female beer-brewers are particularly independent. Women active in tailoring or the sale of edible products or fruit and vegetables (in both monogamous and polygamous marriages) are more often influenced by their husbands. Whether the husbands work in the informal or the modem sector does not make any difference as far as influencing their wives is concerned. The influence of the husband can be positive as well as negative. The positive influence includes the supply of initial capital, advice and support. The negative influence varies from forcing women to be at home in the evening to prepare the meal, to pushing them out to work in the fields during the rainy season. Also some men take the product of their wives without paying for it, or demand money from them.

The importance of the family and domestic duties

According to MacEwen Scott (1991: 125) gender segregation in the informal sector in Lima, Peru, originates from the family as an institution: that affects the entire organisation of small-scale production; which handled resource allocation in a much wider sense and designated certain activities as appropriate for men and other activities as appropriate for women. . . . It 19. The economic participation of women between the ages of 25 and 49 in the urban areas is about 60% for single women, 42%for monogamously married women and from 38 to 50% for polygamously married women. The overall percentages of women over the age of 12 are respectively 24, 34 and 42% (INSD,1989: 216).

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affected the apprenticeship system, the distribution of credit, tools and client networks. Despite their domestic duties, female entrepreneurs spend on average 50 hours a week on their economic activity. Since we did not ask male entrepreneurs how many hours they worked, we cannot compare the two. But 50 hours a week seems to be sufficient to start a male activity. The fact that women with secondary education who use a medium level of technology spend significantly more hours a week (63) on their activity, reinforces this conclusion. There may be another reason for women to choose traditional activities. Since Burkinabi? women generally carry out all the domestic tasks, including child raising, care of the old and disabled, fetching water and wood, cleaning and cooking, they receive training in this range of activities. Virtually all female entrepreneurs receive training in cooking, the preparation of mealy and edible products, meals and beer. Moreover, they often dispose of the tools needed for these domestic tasks. Hence, women wanting to earn an income will choose activities related to their domestic tasks. In which case, what MacEwen Scott noted would be true of Burkina Faso as well. The present study does not provide the information to confirm or deny the role of the family as such an institution. Our conclusion is that women in Ouagadougou are unable to cross all the barriers to enter male activities, and therefore stick to a limited range of female activities.

The importance of policies Little consideration of gender issues is to be found in the government’s existing programmes and policies. For example, the aim of stimulating women to start male activities is absent from the Plan Directeur (1990), from two UN women’s projects (UN, 1990 and 1991) and from the documents of the Office Nationale de la Promotion de 1’Emploi (OWE, 1987). The Plan Directeur is the most important policy document with respect to the informal sector. It makes no mention of how to increase the range of female activities. It claims to pay special attention to the promotion of women, but textiles are the only urban female activity to receive support. The UN projects for women in the informal sector favour female entrepreneurs. However, no direct action is envisaged to enlarge the scope of activities open to them. The credit component of the UN projects provides separate credits for women in the informal sector in Ouagadougou and for women outside the capital. Women in certain activities receive no credit because this would increase the already strong competition in these activities. Credits are used by women to improve their workplace or the quality of their products; others buy raw materials for cash instead of with (supplier’s) credit, or they buy wholesale

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instead of retail. The projects affirm the need to identify new opportunities for women outside Ouagadougou, because they are currently locked into activities with narrow markets (Deslauriers, 1991: 148). All the ONPE studies k l u d e female entrepreneurs, but no actions have been reported that will change the range of activities open to them. One ONPE project, financed by the UN, for rural women in the South-East of Burkina Faso has trained about 3,000 women in female activities like pottery, weaving and straw basketwork. Another ONPE project which trains people in the repair of typewriters is directed specifically to men, however. Although some of the initiatives taken seem to be able to expand women’s access to male activities, we have found no institution which explicitly mentions this as an objective.

Conclusions and recommendations Women in Ouagadougou are able to surmount several barriers in order to start a male dominated activity, notably those of capital, labour and workspace, but they encounter serious problems in trying to cross the barriers to education and skill training and may have problems in the marketing of their products or services. Also it may be difficult for women to employ qualified labour. These problems lead women to stick to the limited range of traditional female activities. Because of their domestic duties, women acquire skills and equipment which they use in their economic activities. The market potential of these activities is low, however, while the need for women to earn an income becomes increasingly urgent. What are the theoretical and policy implications of these conclusions? And what could female entrepreneurs themselves do to broaden the range of activities open to them? Theoretically, it is important to recognise that not only factors related to production for the market can explain the tendency of individual men and women to choose certain activities. In order to clarify the role of women in the informal sector, more in-depth analysis of the division of household tasks seems to be necessary. For policy reasons, it is important to identify which barriers to entry can be removed. Women can obtain access to activities if the authorities help them to gain access to the relevant training in markets where either male rather than female producers are active, or where female customers predominate. For these reasons women have tried tailoring and hairdressing, where customers are found among the richer women, and training is provided specifically in women’s schools or in the informal sector. It also makes sense to direct policies towards activities in which women find outlets but where the barrier of lack of education needs to be removed by training or education. Such activities are scarce. Among the activities surveyed here, only repair of (rnotor)cycles seems a possibility. Among the activities


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listed by the 1985 national census, milling, jewellery, butchery, the sale of cloth and secondhand clothing, domestic service and laundering seem to offer opportunities. These activities actually provide employment for almost 25,000 men and 4,000 women at the national level making 9% of non-farm employment.20 Among the activities list by ONPE (1987), manufacturing of plastic shoes, mirrors and soap, smelting of aluminium, repair of refrigerators and freezers, and taxi driving could offer a potential for women. We have no indication of the number of people already involved in these activities. Soapmaking is traditionally a female activity and some female taxi drivers can already be observed in Ouagadougou. Thirdly, female entrepreneurs themselves, and especially the more successful ones, could try to widen the range of activities open to them. They could try to employ qualified staff specialising in male activities, thereby circumventing the barrier to knowledge and skills. Once the skills are obtained, women could transmit them to other women. They could also send their daughters to schools which could then provide the mothers with new knowledge and skills. Finally, they could change their marketing mix (price, product, place, promotion) in order to attract male customers in male or mixed activities and they could organise themselves into pressure groups to influence the policies of the government and of NGOs. In order to identify activities which deserve additional support, marketing studies need to be carried out to determine how the richer women spend their income. It would also help to know which products or services can be sold by female entrepreneurs to male customers. The activities mentioned above might offer some directions for future research. The question posed by this article, why women cannot currently enter maledominated activities, can be asked on a much wider scale. Ouagadougou is only one city where these kinds of problems occur. Future research should cover developments in informal and formal training on the job. What are the costs of an apprenticeship for young men and young women? Since young women may be needed in the family for household tasks, are their opportunity costs higher? Research needs to investigate whether people employed by entrepreneurs are male or female. It would also be useful to know whether entrepreneurs have previously been employed by men or women. Furthermore, more information is needed on the training received by entrepreneurs as family workers.

20. According to the 1985 census, 312,209 people have their principal economic activity outside agriculture. As a secondary activity 579,395 people chose a non-agricultural activity (Lougue, 1990: 63-4).


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