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Reimagining entrepreneurship in the artisanal and small-scale mining sector: Fresh insights from sub-Saharan Africa

Traoré, Massaran, Hilson, Gavin, Hilson, Abigail (2024) Reimagining entrepreneurship in the artisanal and small-scale mining sector: Fresh insights from sub-Saharan Africa. Africa Journal of Management, 10 (2). pp. 176-207. ISSN 2332-2373. E-ISSN 2332-2381. (doi:10.1080/23322373.2024.2349481) (KAR id:106526)

Abstract

This paper shares new insights on the dynamics of entrepreneurship in the artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) sector, focusing on the case of sub-Saharan Africa. Despite being the region’s most important rural nonfarm activity, and generating finance that sustains a sizable portion of its subsistence/smallholder agricultural economy, ASM has barely featured in the business and management literature. It has rather been scholars from other disciplines who have shared opinions on the individuals who pursue work in this sector and why. They are in broad agreement that in sub-Saharan Africa, ASM sites attract, at the one extreme, people who are desperate for income (the “poverty-driven” category) and, at the other extreme, individuals motivated by the possibility of becoming wealthy (the “get-rich-quick” category). These two narratives map, virtually wholesale, on to the necessity-based-opportunity-based typology of entrepreneurship that business and management scholars have interrogated for decades. This paper fuses these narratives with the typology, with the goal of showcasing ASM within an evolving body of literature on entrepreneurship in sub-Saharan Africa. It then draws on a case study of Kéniéba District (Mali), the location of one of the region’s more dynamic gold-panning industries, to articulate more clearly the sector’s different entrepreneurs.

Item Type: Article
DOI/Identification number: 10.1080/23322373.2024.2349481
Uncontrolled keywords: artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM), entrepreneurship, poverty, sub-Saharan Africa
Subjects: H Social Sciences > HF Commerce > HF5351 Business
H Social Sciences > HF Commerce > HF5601 Accounting
Divisions: Divisions > Kent Business School - Division > Department of Accounting and Finance
SWORD Depositor: JISC Publications Router
Depositing User: JISC Publications Router
Date Deposited: 12 Jul 2024 14:02 UTC
Last Modified: 05 Nov 2024 13:12 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/106526 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

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