Abstract:

Despite the expansion of financial inclusion initiatives in Nigeria, informal women entrepreneurs engaged in cross border trade continue to rely heavily on trust based financial arrangements. Existing scholarship has paid limited attention to the mechanisms that sustain this persistence. This development paper advances a conceptual account of how trust is built and maintained within informal cross border trading networks among women entrepreneurs in Nigeria.

Drawing on Bourdieu’s forms of capital, the article theorises trust as a socially embedded resource that mediates women’s navigation between formal and informal financial systems. The analysis argues that the durability of arrangements such as Esusu reflects rational adaptation to institutional frictions rather than simple financial exclusion. The paper concludes by outlining implications for financial inclusion policy and a future research agenda on trust intensive entrepreneurial contexts.

Please choose your submission type: Developmental Paper

Primary Track: African Studies

Keywords: Entrepreneurial process & other spatial/temporal issues on African entrepreneurship. ;African research on female & gender studies.

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Mrs. Habiba Ikediobi