Publication:
Breaking Barriers: Female Entrepreneurs Who Cross Over to Male-Dominated Sectors

Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Files in English
English PDF (2.64 MB)
5,232 downloads
English Text (563.9 KB)
147 downloads
Date
2022-02-03
ISSN
Published
2022-02-03
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
The report focuses on sectoral choice as one of the contributors to the gender gap in firm performance. It explores the difference in profits among female entrepreneurs who cross over into male-dominated sectors (MDS) compared to those who remain in traditionally female-concentrated sectors (FCS). The report provides a snapshot of the factors associated with being a female entrepreneur who crosses over to MDS, including the most salient cross-country ones that are associated with breaking into and surviving in these sectors. Based on this analysis, it offers evidence-based programs and policies which can support women to cross over into more profitable sectors and contribute to their business performance more generally. The studies in this report were conducted across three regions and in ten countries (Sub-Saharan Africa: Botswana, Uganda, Ethiopia, and Guinea, in Latin America and the Caribbean: Peru and Mexico, and in East Asia and Pacific: Cambodia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic (PDR), Vietnam, and Indonesia). The report also draws from the findings of the global multi-country future of business survey of entrepreneurs carried out through a social media platform.
Link to Data Set
Citation
World Bank. 2022. Breaking Barriers: Female Entrepreneurs Who Cross Over to Male-Dominated Sectors. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/36940 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.
Associated URLs
Associated content
Report Series
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue

Related items

Showing items related by metadata.

  • Publication
    Unlocking the Potential of Women Entrepreneurs in Uganda
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-08-26) Copley, Amy; Gokalp, Birce; Kirkwood, Daniel
    Private sector development is an integral channel through which countries can better leverage the productive potential of the youth bulge, support job creation, and maintain social stability. Entrepreneurship already plays an important role in Sub-Saharan Africa, where forty-two percent of the nonagricultural labor force is self-employed or is an employer, the highest rate in the world. Women business owners in Uganda face several gender-specific barriers to their enterprise performance, including lower levels of innovation, lower use of capital and labor, and segregation into lower-value sectors. This brief focuses on the policy interventions that can help empower women entrepreneurs across Uganda.
  • Publication
    Breaking the Metal Ceiling
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015-12) Campos, Francisco; Goldstein, Markus; McGorman, Laura; Munoz Boudet, Ana Maria; Pimhidzai, Obert
    A range of reasons is cited to explain gender differences in business performance in Africa. Within those, the sector of operations is consistently identified as a major issue. This paper uses a mixed methods approach to assess how women entrepreneurs in Uganda start (and strive) operating firms in male-dominated sectors, and what hinders other women from doing so. The study finds that women who cross over into male-dominated sectors make as much as men, and three times more than women who stay in female-dominated sectors. The paper examines a set of factors to explain the differences in sector choices, and finds that there is a problem of information about opportunities in male-dominated industries. The analysis also concludes that psychosocial factors, particularly the influence of male role models and exposure to the sector from family and friends, are critical in helping women circumvent or overcome the norms that undergird occupational segregation.
  • Publication
    How Have Firms Fared in Times of COVID-19 in Addis Ababa?
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-11-24) Wieser, Christina; Abebe, Girum; Asfaw, Adamsu
    The COVID-19 pandemic and its negative economic effects create a need for timely data and evidence to help monitor and mitigate the social and economic impacts of the crisis. To monitor the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and related containment measures on formal firms in Ethiopia and inform the policy response, the World Bank, in collaboration with the government, is implementing a high-frequency phone survey of firms (HFPS-F). The HFPS-F interviews a sample of firms in Addis Ababa every three weeks for a total of eight survey rounds. This high-frequency follow-up allows for a better understanding of the effects of and responses to the COVID-19 pandemic on firm operations, hiring and firing, and expectations of future operations and labor demand in order to better tailor and implement interventions and policy responses and monitor their effects
  • Publication
    Gender Gaps at the Enterprise Level
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2011-09) Campos, Francisco
    Female-owned small to medium businesses in the Western Cape Province in South Africa are less productive, generate lower revenues and have less employees than male-owned enterprises. In this brief, we use the baseline survey for an impact evaluation of a business development services program to identify why these differences exist and explore paths towards policy interventions to overcome them. Author conclude that the concentration of businesses in low performing sectors, the lack of commitment to the business, the intertwining of household and business responsibilities, and access to finance can be important barriers to the growth of women-headed enterprises. Author suggests targeted alternative interventions to address these constraints and recommend comparing their effectiveness through rigorous evaluations. Author argue that the gender differences identified in the performance of Small, Medium, and Micro Enterprises (SMMEs) in this Province of South Africa can be due to a combination of: 1) the concentration of women-entrepreneurs in a small number of low-performing sectors, 2) firms being seen by entrepreneurs as an interim solution, 3) the intertwining of household and enterprise money, and 4) credit constraints.
  • Publication
    Learning from the Experiments That Never Happened : Lessons from Trying to Conduct Randomized Evaluations of Matching Grant Programs in Africa
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-12) Campos, Francisco; Coville, Aidan; Fernandes, Ana M.; Goldstein, Markus; McKenzie, David
    Matching grants are one of the most common policy instruments used by developing country governments to try to foster technological upgrading, innovation, exports, use of business development services and other activities leading to firm growth. However, since they involve subsidizing firms, the risk is that they could crowd out private investment, subsidizing activities that firms were planning to undertake anyway, or lead to pure private gains, rather than generating the public gains that justify government intervention. As a result, rigorous evaluation of the effects of such programs is important. The authors attempted to implement randomized experiments to evaluate the impact of seven matching grant programs offered in six African countries, but in each case were unable to complete an experimental evaluation. One critique of randomized experiments is publication bias, whereby only those experiments with "interesting" results get published. The hope is to mitigate this bias by learning from the experiments that never happened. This paper describes the three main proximate reasons for lack of implementation: continued project delays, politicians not willing to allow random assignment, and low program take-up; and then delves into the underlying causes of these occurring. Political economy, overly stringent eligibility criteria that do not take account of where value-added may be highest, a lack of attention to detail in "last mile" issues, incentives facing project implementation staff, and the way impact evaluations are funded, and all help explain the failure of randomization. Lessons are drawn from these experiences for both the implementation and the possible evaluation of future projects.

Users also downloaded

Showing related downloaded files

  • Publication
    Thirsty Energy (II)
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2016-01) Sohns, Antonia A.; Rodriguez, Diego J.; Delgado, Anna
    The effect of oil and gas development on local and regional water resources can profoundly change a region’s economic possibilities, its water environment, and the vitality of its ecosystem. It is necessary to tackle the water-energy challenge today through technological innovations and institutional changes, such as integrated planning and valuing water as a resource. More information on the thirsty energy initiative can be found at www. worldbank.org/thirstyenergy.
  • Publication
    State and Trends of Carbon Pricing 2024
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-05-21) World Bank
    This report provides an up-to-date overview of existing and emerging carbon pricing instruments around the world, including international, national, and subnational initiatives. It also investigates trends surrounding the development and implementation of carbon pricing instruments and some of the drivers seen over the past year. Specifically, this report covers carbon taxes, emissions trading systems (ETSs), and crediting mechanisms. Key topics covered in the 2024 report include uptake of ETSs and carbon taxes in low- and middle- income economies, sectoral coverage of ETSs and carbon taxes, and the use of crediting mechanisms as part of the policy mix.
  • Publication
    State and Trends of Carbon Pricing 2018
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2018-05-22) World Bank; Ecofys
    The State and Trends of Carbon Pricing series reflects on the growing momentum for carbon pricing worldwide. It targets the wide audience of public and private stakeholders engaged in carbon pricing design and implementation. This report provides an up-to-date overview of existing and emerging carbon pricing instruments around the world, including national and subnational initiatives. It also investigates trends surrounding the development of carbon pricing instruments and how they could accelerate to deliver long-term mitigation goals.
  • Publication
    Women, Business and the Law 2024
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-03-04) World Bank
    Women, Business and the Law 2024 is the 10th in a series of annual studies measuring the enabling conditions that affect women’s economic opportunity in 190 economies. To present a more complete picture of the global environment that enables women’s socioeconomic participation, this year Women, Business and the Law introduces two new indicators—Safety and Childcare—and presents findings on the implementation gap between laws (de jure) and how they function in practice (de facto). This study presents three indexes: (1) legal frameworks, (2) supportive frameworks (policies, institutions, services, data, budget, and access to justice), and (3) expert opinions on women’s rights in practice in the areas measured. The study’s 10 indicators—Safety, Mobility, Workplace, Pay, Marriage, Parenthood, Childcare, Entrepreneurship, Assets, and Pension—are structured around the different stages of a woman’s working life. Findings from this new research can inform policy discussions to ensure women’s full and equal participation in the economy. The indicators build evidence of the critical relationship between legal gender equality and women’s employment and entrepreneurship. Data in Women, Business and the Law 2024 are current as of October 1, 2023.
  • Publication
    Global Economic Prospects, January 2025
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-01-16) World Bank
    Global growth is expected to hold steady at 2.7 percent in 2025-26. However, the global economy appears to be settling at a low growth rate that will be insufficient to foster sustained economic development—with the possibility of further headwinds from heightened policy uncertainty and adverse trade policy shifts, geopolitical tensions, persistent inflation, and climate-related natural disasters. Against this backdrop, emerging market and developing economies are set to enter the second quarter of the twenty-first century with per capita incomes on a trajectory that implies substantially slower catch-up toward advanced-economy living standards than they previously experienced. Without course corrections, most low-income countries are unlikely to graduate to middle-income status by the middle of the century. Policy action at both global and national levels is needed to foster a more favorable external environment, enhance macroeconomic stability, reduce structural constraints, address the effects of climate change, and thus accelerate long-term growth and development.