Performance of Micro and Small Enterprises: Female Entrepreneurs in North Gondar, Ethiopia

Abstract

The primary aim of micro and small enterprises in a developing economy is creation of employment opportunities and eradication of poverty. The present study is to examines the performance of female owned micro and small enterprises (MSEs) in North Gondar Zone, Ethiopia. To reach out the stated objective, data were collected through survey questionnaire from the population of 14,571 MSEs operating in the Zone, using two stages of sampling; purposive and simple random. The result depicts that gender of the operator has no significant relationship with the performance of MSEs in the study area. While common factors are hindering the performance of male and female owned MSEs, specifically, female owned MSEs’ performance was positively affected by completion of secondary education and formal business skills training. It also observed that female owned enterprises, operating and merchandising, have shown significantly positive performance.