Digitalisation, Innovation and Productivity in South African Micro- and Small Enterprises

Cyrielle Gaglio (), Erika Kraemer-Mbula () and Edward Lorenz ()
Additional contact information
Cyrielle Gaglio: University of Helsinki, Department of Economics and Management, Finland and Sciences Po, OFCE, France. Email:
Erika Kraemer-Mbula: DSI/NRF/Newton Fund Trilateral Chair in Transformative Innovation, the Fourth Industrial Revolution and Sustainable Development, University of Johannesburg, South Africa.
Edward Lorenz: University of Côte d’Azur, France, University of Johannesburg, South Africa and Aalborg University, Denmark

No 2022-09, SARChI-ID Working Papers from SARChI Industrial Development (SARChI-ID), University of Johannesburg (UJ)

Abstract: This paper studies the links between the use of digital communication technologies, innovation performance and productivity for a sample of micro- and small enterprises (MSEs) in a middle-income country, South Africa. Based on the results of an original survey carried out in 2019, we investigate these links for a sample of 711 manufacturing MSEs located in Johannesburg. We estimate the relationships sequentially, firstly estimating the relationship between digitalisation and innovation, and secondly the relationship between innovation and productivity. Our results show that selected digital communication technologies, including the use of social media and a business mobile phone for surfing the internet, have a positive effect on innovation, and that innovation conditional on the use of these technologies has a positive effect on labour productivity.

Keywords: Digital communication technologies; Product innovation; Productivity; MSEs; Johannesburg (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O14 O31 O4 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 29 pages
Date: 2022-06, Revised 2022-06
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Published

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.uj.ac.za/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/sa ... lorenz-june-2022.pdf First version, 2022 (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:adz:wpaper:202209

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in SARChI-ID Working Papers from SARChI Industrial Development (SARChI-ID), University of Johannesburg (UJ) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Melanie Ridgard ().