The Class Connotation

Women in the informal sector have been given several names signifying the type of economic activities they are doing or the level of their status in the community. Many of the names are derivative. For example, in Ghana, the market women are called Makola; in Tanzania, especially in Dar es Salaam - the low class women who cook and sell food in open spaces and make-shift shatters are popularly known as mama ntilie. In Yaunde and Gaundere, Cameroun, women display their merchandizes and products under umbrellas along the side walks hence the name, “umbrella women.”

The names attached to these women show a class connotation of the whole sector. Since the business and types of commodities sold in the sector vary in size, women in Tanzania engage in business according to their financial capability and knowledge to handle the business. In this sense, it is both an open and closed sector. There is no specialization and therefore people can get in and move out easily. At the same time, some women may not feel comfortable engaging themselves in certain activities categorized as informal businesses. For example, many women do not like to associate themselves with prostitution and the brewing of illicit beer though these are categorized as informal business by some scholars. However, others feel they have no alternative except to engage themselves in such jobs.

It is also a gender issue. Most of the businesses carried out by women in this sector are within the traditional division of labour based on sex. It is therefore, not surprising that even the international community and agencies tend to favour and support the economic activities of women in Tanzania, which fall under the traditional division of labour. Most of them are within what I have called the “5ks” meaning: Kusuka, Kufuma/Kushona; Kupika, and Kusaga.

Table 1 summarises the economic activities of various women surveyed in Dar es Salaam, Arusha and Kilimanjaro Regions and reveals some interesting social dimensions of women in the informal sector. Some of the upper class women are involved in the export of prawns, horticulture and clothing business. Unlike Kenya, Tanzania does not have strong women groups exporting crafts like those who are in the kiondo business. It is unfortunate that in Tanzania, both men and women lack the most basic business requirements such as viable capital, aggressiveness, and marketing strategies. Only women in the upper class have had an opportunity to get loans from banks.

Table 1: Women in Informal Sector: Their Place in the Society

Source: Various Reports from the Field 1987-1990

I have purposely left out some of the business that many women are involved in because they didn’t feature much in my researches on women’s small entrepreneurship. This does not however’ mean that they are non-existent. Nevertheless, I would like to classify and comment briefly on the type of local beer sold by poor women in the informal sector. These types of locally brewed beer, many of them brewed at the backyards, have a variety of names. In Dar es Salaam we have the komoni; in Mwanga we have dengelua and puya; in Ngara we have ugwangwa; in Moshi we have mbege and in Mbeya we have kindi, ulamzi and komoni to mention just a few of the locally brewed beers. These types of beer are mainly for the consumption of low class people, both in rural and urban centres.

The link that exists between the classes of women and the formal sector can be discussed very briefly. From Table 1 above, it can be deduced that most of the women are engaged in the service sector which touches the working class. They provide essential services which can not be obtained easily in other places, by ordinary workers.

Nevertheless even the upper class is served by the women who do business activities targeted to low income people. For example, the mama ntilies whose job is to cook simple, but “adequate” food in open spaces of Dar es Salaam, serve people of different classes. When the University of Dar es Salaam introduced the system of providing the students with cash meal allowances in the 1988/89 academic year (instead of providing them with food from University cafeteria), many students bought their meals from the mama ntilies. The students call these cooking stalls “Hiltons” to match with their aspired social class instead of magenge which carries low class status. The food from these stalls is sold at a cheaper price which the students can afford while saving some money for their other accepted needs.

In the urban areas some people do not take their breakfast anywhere else but at the mama ntilies. At construction sites and near the factories, workers get their hot meals from the mama ntilie makeshift “hotels”. At Mwanza harbour, “mama ntilie hotels” serve the passengers who are waiting for the boats to arrive.

The majority of people including those in the middle class, who eat spinach, dough-nuts (maandazi, vitumbua) or flat cakes chapati get their food from the women who prepare them from their houses. These may be prepared from the normal kitchens or along the backyards or corridors. So, workers save time due to the services provided by these women.

The link between this sector, especially as carried out by women, with the formal one can only be observed in the tie-and dye clothing, retail business and the export of horticulture. Locally made products such as baskets, mats and pots, are very often sold at tourist centres and shops. People in Tanzania have not been well organized for export oriented business although there is a great potential. Thus a direct relationship between what women do in the formal and informal sectors needs more research and analysis, focusing on dress making, horticulture and export business, which are emerging now.

One thing which automatically happens among the rural women as a result their informal businesses is networking. While doing research in Kilimanjaro during 1987, I found out that market women in Mwanga town had developed a kind of network with women from the rural and mountainous areas of Ugweno. The network works well among the individuals and is very informal. Friendship and good social relationship between the buyer and the seller become the basis for conducting business, in this case, people go beyond the business relationship (which ends with a transaction) to more socially oriented relationships which last beyond the business transaction.