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Abstract
Covid-19 has fast become a global catastrophic pandemic affecting all facets of life, including people’s livelihoods. Despite the devastating impact COVID-19 has caused across the globe, little has been researched on how lockdown intervention measures have affected livelihoods of entrepreneurial women. This study assesses how the conditions characterising the COVID-19 induced lockdown affected the livelihoods of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) entrepreneurial women in the Masvingo Province of Zimbabwe. The study reveals that COVID-19 lockdown in Zimbabwe was (and continues to be) marred with enforced restrictions on women in the informal sector. Women in the urban areas were the most affected. The vulnerability context among urban women was characterised by shock, stress and restlessness. Based on findings of this study, we advance that COVID-19 induced lockdown paralysed entrepreneurial women’s capital assets thereby militating against their self-sustenance, self-reliance and advancement. The closure of markets, mobility permits, corruption on COVID-19 relief cash transfer and subsidised mealie-meal worsened the entrepreneurial women’s shocks, stresses and restlessness. We therefore conclude that the impact of COVID-19 has not only compromised nations’ food security and health systems, but most importantly paralysed entrepreneurial women’s livelihoods, yet women in the African context, musha mukadzi – without a mother there is no home.
Highlights
In the past, we have had global repeated epidemics such as smallpox in the 18th and 19th centuries, bubonic plague (1901–1907), ‘Spanish’ flu (1918–1919), polio (1944–1963) and ongoing HIV and AIDS (1982–to present)
Despite the devastating impact COVID-19 has caused across all spheres of life the world-over, little has been researched on how the World Health Organisation (WHO) – derived lockdown intervention measures have affected livelihoods of women, and especially entrepreneurial women
The interviews allowed respondents to comment on women vulnerability, assets, and capabilities All key participants, vendors and the two associations targeted through these tools comprised participants who had ‘stories to tell’ (Creswell & Creswell, 2013:155) and who could “purposefully inform an understanding” (Gonye, 2016:60) on the level of affection the lockdown has had on women livelihoods
Summary
We have had global repeated epidemics such as smallpox in the 18th and 19th centuries, bubonic plague (1901–1907), ‘Spanish’ flu (1918–1919), polio (1944–1963) and ongoing HIV and AIDS (1982–to present). It is against this backdrop that this study interrogates conditions characterizing COVID-19 induced lockdown, how they affected the livelihoods of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) of entrepreneurial women in Masvingo Province of Zimbabwe. In the context of COVID-19, lockdown regulations had banned, restricted mobility and access to assets and the capability of women in informal and non –essential services (GoZ, 2020).
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