Gender differential factors affecting the involvement and progress of men and women in formal businesses: a case of Kapata Market, Chipata District

Abstract

The study examined gender differential factors affecting the involvement and progress of men and women in formal businesses at Kapata Market in Chipata District. Studies conducted worldwide on women entrepreneurship concentrate on the informal business sector and little has been done in addressing women’s involvement and progress in the formal business sector comparatively with men. The main objective of the study was to investigate how gender differential factors affect the involvement and progress of men and women in formal businesses at Kapata Market of Chipata District. This study specifically explored how social, culture, legal framework, startup capital and networking affect the involvement and progress of men and women in formal businesses. The study used the descriptive design comprising of quantitative and qualitative approaches. The total target population was 87 registered entrepreneurs. Using stratified sampling, two sampling frames of 48 male and 39 female registered entrepreneurs were developed, from which 39 males and 32 females were sampled, making a total of 71 respondents. Simple random sampling technique was used to pick actual participants from the two sampling frames who responded to the questionnaire. The study also used purposive sampling to select 8 key informants; two each from Patent and Companies Registration Agency, Zambia National Commercial Bank, Bank ABC and the Ministry of Community Development and Social Services. Quantitative data was analysed using SPSS and Qualitative data thematically. The study revealed that gender roles such as household chores hampered the progress of women in formal entrepreneurship because they did not have enough time to attend to their businesses. The study found out that 12.9% of female entrepreneurs got loans from micro financial services against 5.1% of male entrepreneurs. However, the study indicated that women face challenges in accessing bigger loans from banks due to lack of collateral whilst both men and women did not do well in networking. The study recommends that government and non-governmental organisations should advocate for equality in performing home chores to give women more time to do productive works, engage chiefs to also give land to women, commercial bank to give collateral free loans and grants to women and the business community to promote business networks.