COVID-19 and micro-enterprises: an study in Bogotá-Colombia

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has generated a global crisis and forced conjuncture research exercises. In Colombia, microenterprises make up more than 90% of the business fabric and have a survival rate of less than 30%. This qualitative study explores how a group of micro-enterprises in the industrial sector faced the challenges of COVID-19. The field work was carried out by applying a semi-structural interview to a sample of 50 microenterprises formalized through the commercial register. The data was processed in the Nvivo software with four categories of analysis: impacts, government support, strategies to face the crisis and future decisions. The results show how COVID-19 made visible a dilemma that seemed obsolete: the tension between solidarity and flexibility in the world of work. In addition, there was evidence of a trend towards basic digital transformation and adjustment in business models with strong financial and operating restrictions due to insufficient state support. It is concluded that the microenterprise sector has particular management logics that are very susceptible to socioeconomic situations, and that they are expressed in tensions between formality and informality.