Paper Number

1642

Abstract

Research on how COVID-19 is creating a crisis-within-a-crisis situation for the world’s most vulnerable communities by compounding their daily struggles and economic hardships is still developing. Accordingly, we utilise the everyday trading experiences of micro-entrepreneurs in Kenya’s informal settlements to contextualise how they tackled this unfolding situation through digital community currency (DCC). Our mixed-methods research draws on effectuation and connects entrepreneurial action with DCC. While field work yielded new knowledge on how micro-entrepreneurs sustained their livelihoods and maintained savings by leveraging DCC, statistics demonstrated evidence of effectual reasoning in alleviating the adverse effects of COVID-19 in terms of access to necessities and the application of affordable loss logic in price setting. Micro-entrepreneurs who were able to deploy available means to implement COVID-19 preventive practices were proactive in adjusting selling prices, whereas those who found it difficult were more likely to increase the prices of their traded goods and services.

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