Proceedings of the FIREtalk Conference - Research on FIRE! (research-on-fire 2025)

FIREtalk Conference - Research on FIRE! (research-on-fire 2025)

📍Mannheim, Germany🗓️ 26-28 August 2025
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Economic Integration and Women Entrepreneurs’ Involvement in Cross-Border Trade: The Case of the East African Community

Authors
Akinyi Lydia Sassi1, *
1School of Business Studies and Humanities, The Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology, P.O. BOX 447, Arusha, Tanzania
*Corresponding author. Email: akinyi.lydia@gmail.com
Corresponding Author
Akinyi Lydia Sassi
Available Online 13 June 2026.
DOI
10.2991/978-94-6239-705-7_28How to use a DOI?
Keywords
Economic Integration; Women Entrepreneurs; Cross-Border Trade; The East African Community
Abstract

The study aimed to assess how economic integration supports women entrepreneurs’ engagement in cross-border trade, with a focus on the East African Community (EAC). Three policy documents and four policy practices were analysed using an adapted reading guide, coupled with content and discourse analysis, to categorise the data and understand the patterns and meanings of the imagery and text. Findings revealed that the EAC has made efforts to consider gender and women’s empowerment issues. The policy documents have included clauses that specifically show the intention to support women’s entrepreneurship engagement in cross-border trade, and some projects have been implemented. However, it was noted that there is little inclusion of gender and women’s empowerment issues in the trade policy, which is the main policy governing trade. Additionally, in some cases, language bias was observed, women entrepreneurs were treated as homogeneous, and there was a limited focus on system change; more emphasis was placed on “fixing the women.”

Copyright
© 2026 The Author(s)
Open Access
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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Volume Title
Proceedings of the FIREtalk Conference - Research on FIRE! (research-on-fire 2025)
Series
Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research
Publication Date
13 June 2026
ISBN
978-94-6239-705-7
ISSN
2352-5398
DOI
10.2991/978-94-6239-705-7_28How to use a DOI?
Copyright
© 2026 The Author(s)
Open Access
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

Cite this article

risenwbib
TY  - CONF
AU  - Akinyi Lydia Sassi
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/06/13
TI  - Economic Integration and Women Entrepreneurs’ Involvement in Cross-Border Trade: The Case of the East African Community
BT  - Proceedings of the FIREtalk Conference - Research on FIRE! (research-on-fire 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 398
EP  - 406
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-94-6239-705-7_28
DO  - 10.2991/978-94-6239-705-7_28
ID  - Sassi2026
ER  -