Title: Maltas gear for San leather: an exploratory entrepreneurial experiment three decades after Namibian independence

Authors: Wilfred Isak April

Addresses: Maltas Club Namibia, Private Bag 13301, Windhoek, Namibia

Abstract: Namibia is the last colony in Sub-Saharan Africa to gain independence (21 March 1990). Namibia set a precedent in becoming the first to specifically base its sector of the economy on the small business sector, however three decades after independence some indigenous people, such as the San people in Tsumkwe rely mostly on the informal sector. The cultural legacy and heritage have never been enhanced by bringing them closer to sanitation, healthcare and running clean drinking water. The village of Tsumkwe, where formal enterprises are almost non-existent, entrepreneurship taking place in the informal sector. This study is as a result of an ethnographic enquiry of a Maltas Club Namibia student, who went on an excursion to the San village and change their Maltas uniform for San leather. This paper is qualitative in nature and make use of in-depth interviews and participant observation, as some of the methods to the study.

Keywords: Maltas Club Namibia; San; Tsumkwe; conservancy; indigenous entrepreneurship; self-employment; hut; n!oresi; Ju|'hoan; veldfood.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBG.2024.138525

International Journal of Business and Globalisation, 2024 Vol.37 No.1, pp.85 - 110

Received: 06 Jun 2020
Accepted: 05 Jul 2020
Published online: 09 May 2024 *

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