THE ROLE OF GLOBAL SYSTEM FOR MOBILE TELECOMMUNICATION SERVICES IN SMALL SCALE ENTERPRISES: AN IMPETUS FOR INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIA

Micah Damilola John and Okafor Emeka Emmanuel
Additional contact information
Micah Damilola John: Department of Sociology, Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba-Akoko, Nigeria.
Okafor Emeka Emmanuel: Department of Sociology, University of Ibadan, Nigeria.

Post-Print from HAL

Abstract: It is a common phenomenon to see hawkers of Global System for Mobile Telecommunication (GSM) services in every nook and cranny of Nigerian streets, markets, schools and other busy places transacting telecommunication services. This is consequent upon GSM revolution witnessed in Nigeria more than a decade ago. The study specifically investigated contributions of GSM services to small scale enterprises (SSEs) and how the small scale traders perceived benefits and challenges thereof. Merton's model of manifest and latent function was adopted. The study was conducted in Ibadan Main City (MC) and Less City (LC). Descriptive design was used. A sample of 40 respondents was selected purposively. Qualitative method of data collection and analysis was used while in-depth interviews served as instrument of data collection. Respondents in MC and LC described GSM services as main source of economic empowerment, although hawkers in MC were more committed to business than those in LC. Hawkers in MC preferred sales of bulk recharge cards to call centres. In LC, hawkers were engaged in both call centres and sales of recharge cards, though their business investments were relatively small. Hawkers in MC and LC complained bitterly about incessant network failure and this really affected volume of their sales. GSM services now engage unemployed youths, literate and non literate, graduates across board (tertiary, secondary and primary). Apart from hawkers, there are now GSM technicians self employed in the sector. It is imperative that government and other stakeholders in the sector should work hand in hand to remove impediments that hamper gains to consumers.

Date: 2017-10-16
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Published in Journal of Global Economics, Management and Business Research, 2017, 9 (4), pp.168-177

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

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:hal:journl:hal-05363999

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Post-Print from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().