ABSTRACT
Worried by discrimination against women in Akokoland, and generally in every community in Yorubaland, this chapter points out that since the precolonial period, women had the capability to perform functions for sustainable growth in handicrafts with which they supported the society. The chapter examines an aspect of the informal economy in the Akoko region. However, the chapter notes some cultural constraints against women in participating in the indigenous economy in Akokoland. It discusses women’s entrepreneurship and argues that girl-children were not given adequate literacy education, which had an adverse effect on the growth of Akokoland. The chapter, therefore, discovered that entrepreneurship was prominent among the rural women in Akoko society, which enhanced steady economic growth under our period and even beyond. The chapter unveils women’s role in traditional rural crafts, and it adopts a narrative method to explain the study. The chapter concludes that women’s values and aspirations could be fully realized in the twenty-first century if women were given access to formal education.
