Personal assets, access to credit and gender entrepreneurial disparities: the case of the South African informal sector

This article aims to analyze the nature of South African entrepreneurship and to assess the extent to which obstacles and especially liquidity constraints faced by women may differ from those met by men during the phase of firm settlement. This study shows that women in the informal sector who are less educated and more burdened by unemployment are more “necessity-based” or “push” entrepreneurs than their male counterparts. They appear to have greater difficulty in accumulating sufficient personal assets than their male counterparts. They thus rely more often on stokvel or money lenders to access credit than men.