Digital divides among microsized firms: Evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa

Damien Girollet

Bordeaux Economics Working Papers from Bordeaux School of Economics (BSE)

Abstract: This paper explores digital inequalities in access and usage among 3,300 firms and entrepreneurs from eight sub-Saharan African countries. To account for informal firms’ heterogeneity, we identify three segments: an upper tier of top performers, a lower tier of survivalists, and an intermediate segment composed of constrained gazelles. Although digital technologies are already used by most of the informal entrepreneurs in Sub-Saharan Africa, our findings suggest that the diffusion of these new technologies is uneven across informal firms, digital inequalities being rooted in the already existing socioeconomic inequalities. Indeed, digital inequalities align with the hierarchy of informal sectors in each country and are associated with entrepreneurs’ and firms’ characteristics. Using multivariate analysis, we find that gender and rural/urban digital divides persist in the productive sphere. At the same time, firms with a high level of informality, low profits, precarious operating conditions, and no access to financial services are less likely to use digital technologies.

Keywords: Digital technology; ICT; digital divide; informality; Africa. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D22 O17 O33 O55 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dev, nep-ent, nep-ict, nep-iue, nep-pay and nep-sbm
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://bordeauxeconomicswp.u-bordeaux.fr/2023/2023-03.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:grt:bdxewp:2023-03

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Bordeaux Economics Working Papers from Bordeaux School of Economics (BSE) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Ernest Miguelez ().