Invisible entrepreneurs: Recognising women traders in South Africa's hustle economy

IN SOUTH Africa, the word hustle often conjures up the image young men selling iPhones and sneakers on Instagram, the teenager washing cars at the corner, or the boys lingering outside a spaza shop asking for R2. Their creativity and energy embody one face of hustling: quick, visible, entrepreneurial activity that thrives on immediacy and modern platforms.

- BOITSHOKO SHOKE AND LONDANI MPHARALALA

This side of hustle is celebrated as a bold response to unemployment and limited opportunities, showcasing how youth reimagine livelihoods in a precarious economy.

But hustle has another quieter, less visible, yet far more enduring face. This is the hustle of women, particularly those over thirty-five, who sustain South Africa's informal economy through daily enterprise.

They are the traders at taxi ranks, the women running home-based food businesses, the resellers of shoes and clothing, and the stokvel organisers who manage local financial ecosystems.