Working Paper #2020-028
COVID-19, Lockdowns, and Africa’s Informal Sector: Lessons from Ghana
Using unique survey data on informal enterprises, we draw inferences
about the potential effects of COVID-19 on informal enterprises in
Ghana, beyond the anecdotes which currently dominate the discourse. We
draw important lessons on how the lockdown may affect the performance of
female- and male-owned informal enterprises in two urban areas of Ghana,
Accra and Tema. The following results emerge from the multivariate
decomposition regression: first, we find an unexplained spatial gap in
sales between informal owners who reside in Accra and Tema. Second, we
find no gender gap in sales or innovation, however, there are explained
and unexplained gender-gaps in how size affects current sales of
informal enterprises. Hence, given that the lockdown affects business
performance, we conjecture that the COVID-19 pandemic is likely to
increase or introduce gender- and spatial-gaps in the performance of
informal enterprises.
- Keywords
-
- COVID-19
- Gender
- Informal enterprises
- Urban areas
- sub-Saharan Africa
- Ghana
- JEL codes
-
- D72
- O55
- J16
- P16
- R12
Cite this as
APA 7th ed.Avenyo, E., Francois, J. N., & Zinyemba, T. (2020). COVID-19, Lockdowns, and Africa’s Informal Sector: Lessons from Ghana (UNU-MERIT Working Paper No. 2020-028). UNU-MERIT. https://unu-merit.nl/publications/working-papers/abstract/?id=8534