Understanding the gendered impact of COVID-19 on young self-employed Nigerian women and co-producing solutions that foster better systems

 

The COVID-19 pandemic and efforts to control it have threatened livelihoods, introduced new workplace risks and made unstable work relationships even more precarious, especially for women. This project will study the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and other disruptive events on the work and well-being of self-employed young women vis-à-vis self-employed young men, using qualitative interviews, secondary data analysis and digital storytelling.

The overall aim of this project is to support a suitable and contextually appropriate gender-transformative intervention to improve income security, mental, physical and social health, and social support systems for self-employed young women. Working with these women using policy analysis, focus group discussions and theory of change workshops, in addition to piloting and evaluating the intervention, will result in co-produced, actionable solutions to mitigate the effects of these disruptors on their work and well-being. The research will be primarily conducted in Oyo State in southwestern Nigeria. 

This project is funded under Women’s health and economic empowerment for a COVID-19 Recovery that is Inclusive, Sustainable and Equitable (Women RISE), an initiative of IDRC, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. Its aim is to support global action-oriented, gender-transformative research by teams of researchers from low- and middle-income countries and Canada.