Research Report No 106 Rodrick Mupedziswa Perpetua Gumbo Structural Adjustment and Women Informal Sector Traders in Harare, Zimbabwe Nordiska Afrikainstitutet Uppsala 1998 This report was commissioned and produced under the auspices of the Nordic Africa Institute’s programme on The Political and Social Context of Structural Adjustment in Sub-Saharan Africa. It is one of a series of reports published on the theme of structural adjustment and socioeconomic change in contemporary Africa. Programme Coordinator and Series Editor: Adebayo Olukoshi Indexing terms Structural adjustment Informal sector Trade Women Zimbabwe Language checking: Elaine Almén ISSN 1104-8425 ISBN 91-7106-435-4 © the authors and Nordiska Afrikainstitutet 1998 Printed in Sweden by Motala Grafiska, Motala 1998 Contents 1. Introduction......................................................7 2. Theoretical Orientation...........................................8 3. Summary of Findings from Phases One and Two................10 4. Related Research and Update....................................13 4.1 Population Census results: 1992...................................13 4.2 Micro-enterprises.................................................14 4.3 Access to SDA....................................................15 4.4 Developments in the social sectors................................16 5. Rationale for Current Phase of Study............................19 6. Aims and Objectives of the Study ...............................22 6.1 Aim of the study.................................................22 6.2 Study objectives..................................................22 7. Areas of In-Depth Follow-Up....................................23 7.1 Import liberalisation and cross-border trade.......................23 7.2 Access to the SDA Fund..........................................24 7.3 Market Saturation................................................24 7.4 Intra-household gender relations.................................25 7.5 Gender bias in education: implications............................25 8. Methodology....................................................26 8.1 Study location....................................................26 8.2 Sample...........................................................26 8.3 Data collection techniques........................................27 8.4 Feasibility........................................................27 8.5 Untraceables.....................................................28 9. Limitations of the Study.........................................30 9.1 Impact of unstable weather conditions............................30 9.2 Reduced sample size.............................................30 9.3 Over-researched area.............................................30 9.4 Time lag and intermittent nature of activities......................31 10. Women in Informal Trade: Profile Revisited.....................32 10.1 Age..............................................................32 10.2 Marital status ....................................................33 10.3 Number of children..............................................34 10.4 Educational level.................................................35 10.5 Distribution of respondents by area of residence..................35 10.6 Household size...................................................35 11. Changes in Economic Activities 1993–95.........................37 11.1 Working environment............................................37 11.2 New ventures....................................................39 11.3 Ventures stopped ................................................40 11.4 Rules of entry....................................................43 11.5 Working arrangements...........................................44 11.6 Keeping of records...............................................45 11.7 Financial returns.................................................46 11.8 Comparisons of activity with the previous phases.................49 11.9 Perceptions of why business had changed.........................50 11.10 Plans for the future...............................................51 12. Changes in Household Consumption Patterns...................53 12.1 Impact on food...................................................53 12.2 Changes in education.............................................56 12.3 Changes in health................................................60 12.4 Changes in accommodation and facilities.........................64 12.5 Knowledge of the Social Dimensions Fund........................68 13. Changes in Women’s Productive, Household and Community Management Roles...............................................73 13.1 Head of household...............................................73 13.2 Support of relatives ..............................................75 13.3 Change in financial responsibility.................................76 13.4 Husband’s contribution to household expenses...................79 13.5 Responsibility for major household share.........................81 13.6 Maintenance.....................................................83 13.7 Pension..........................................................84 13.8 Household management role.....................................85 13.9 Community management role....................................89 14. The Impact of ESAP on Intra-Household and Inter-Household Linkages.........................................................93 14.1 Changes in household structure..................................93 14.2 Impact on marriage...............................................94 14.3 Relationship with members of the extended family................96 14.4 Links with the rural home........................................96 14.5 Female kinship-based working partnerships......................98 14.6 Working relationships with non-kin..............................99 15. Economic Crisis, ESAP and Intra-Women Differentiation.......100 15.1 Cross border trade ..............................................104 15.2 Flea markets ....................................................105 16. Perceptions of ESAP............................................109 16.1 Views of ESAP..................................................109 16.2 Differentiation in views of ESAP.................................111 17. Conclusions ....................................................114 17.1 Lack of diversification...........................................116 17.2 Lack of opportunities for accumulation..........................116 17.3 Lack of upward mobility........................................116 17.4 Deepening crisis.................................................117 17.5 Insurmountable barriers remain intact...........................117 17.6 The gender question.............................................117 17.7 Increasing differentiation among women traders.................118 17.8 Gender differentials.............................................119 17.9 The Social Dimensions Fund.....................................119 17.10 Can the poor absorb the costs of adjustment?.....................119 References.............................................................121 Map of Zimbabwe 1. Introduction Zimbabwe, like many other countries in the developing world in general and Africa in particular, accepted World Bank/IMF prescriptions for economic reform by adopting an orthodox economic recovery programme. This programme, known locally as the Economic Structural Adjustment Programme (ESAP), was launched in 1990, and since its adoption, there has been increasing concern about its effects on vulnerable and poverty-prone groups in the country. Studies carried out in many countries that have accepted similar reform programmes—for example, Mozambique, Zambia, Tanzania, Kenya and Ghana—have suggested that vulnerable groups have not been adequately protected from the adverse effects of their implementation, nor have they been fully integrated into the mainstream of economic planning (Gibbon et al., 1992). Research findings from other African countries have also indicated that SAPs have heightened gender inequalities, especially in relation to men and women’s paid and unpaid work (Brand et al., 1993). Women engaged in informal trading activities represent one particular group that has been vulnerable to the negative effects of adjustment. The importance of assessing the situation of women informal traders under the ESAP environment prevailing in Zimbabwe prompted the original study which was initiated in 1992 with a longitudinal perspective in mind. A total of 175 women engaged in informal trade in Harare were interviewed in December 1992 (Phase One) and follow-up interviews with the same women were conducted in October 1993 (Phase Two). Phase three interviews, which are the basis of the current research report, were conducted two years later, in October 1995. The study had two basic aims: a) To assess the impact of the economic reform programme (ESAP) on the different categories of women engaged in various informal sector trading activities in greater Harare. b) To identify new household survival strategies developed under ESAP within the same population. 8 2. Theoretical Orientation The informal sector has, over the years, assumed centre stage in the writings of many authors interested in understanding the survival strategies of marginalised and vulnerable groups, particularly in developing countries. As noted in the previous phase of the study (Brand et al., 1995:133), various attempts have been made to theorise this sector, and many of these writings have emphasised the common situation of informal sector operators, i.e. uniform conditions and outcomes. This is the theme that has been evident right from the original “discovery” of the sector as a locus of marginals and outcasts (Hart, 1973), through to its partial rehabilitation by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) following its “Employment Missions” to Colombia, Sri Lanka and Kenya which resulted in the characterisation of the sector as an employment option of “second resort”, and Moser’s (1979) view of it as a homogeneous form of “petty commodity production”. The theme of uniformity of conditions and outcomes is a thread which also runs through even more recent works, including that of Del Boca and Forte (1982) who have referred to the informal sector as the “parallel economy”, Tanzi (1982) who calls it the “underground economy”, Feige (1987) who describes it as the “hidden economy”, and Castells and Portes (1989) who have also conceptualised it as a single “underground economy” pushed out of regulation by the adoption of sub-contracting processes on a mass scale. This same theme is evident too in the work of Maliyamkono and Bagachwa (1990) who have referred to the informal sector as the “second economy”, and in many of the earlier studies done in the context of Zimbabwe (e.g., Davies, 1978). One underlying assumption which informed the initiation of this study was that the thesis of uniformity in the informal sector may be overstated. This was an assumption that proved to be more than justified; the evidence that was available to us indicated that differentiation is much more widespread in the sector than is commonly assumed. Only more recently, in the work of de Soto (1989), for example, have major contributors to the debate consistently incorporated a recognition of the sector’s deep internal differentiation in their analysis. However, as Brand et al. (1995) note, even de Soto analyses this aspect essentially according to an implicit notion of the enterprise life cycle, whereby, for example, informal traders inexorably rise from itinerant street vending to shop front trading, to fixed market stalls; 9 more structural forms of differentiation are denied or neglected. The work by Brand (1986) best approximates the new orientation as it has shown the existence of differentiation, linked to gender, between operators in different branches of Zimbabwe’s informal sector. 10