MIGRANT AND ETHNIC BUSINESSES IN THE ELEPHANT & CASTLE AND WALWORTH AREA
Wen qi G u / Mic hele Katzler / Vi o l a Petrel l a / Ch l o e Treg er / Qi a n h u i Wei
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Cover image: Elephant Road taken by Patria Roman, Latin Elephant Word count for this document: 4992
INDEX Aim of the Research 5 Background information: the Opportunity Area
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Migrant and Ethnic Businesses
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Migrant and Ethnic Business Clusters
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The New Southwark Plan 9 Empirical Research 11 What Next? 19 Appendix 21 Bibliography and Sources 27
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AIM OF THE RESEARCH The Elephant and Castle Opportunity Area is undergoing a large-scale regeneration. This will bring benefits and opportunities to the area, but also challenges and threats to local residents and businesses. There is a strong likelihood that the population of the area will change leading to new expectations from a new demographic. There is fear of increases in rent and rates, competition between old and new, and the concern that the needs of those who are disadvantaged will be ignored in the plan. This report builds on the research carried out by Patria Roman from Latin Elephant (LE) by making use of the same methodological approach and survey. This allowed us to draw on some preliminary conclusions and merge data to provide recommendations for migrant and ethnic businesses (MEBs) in the borough.
It also draws in LE’s argument at the Examination in Public of the Further Alterations to the London Plan, regarding the disconnect between urban policy and MEBs, particularly given that a point recommended by LE was adopted in the final version of the London Plan. This work may also help the Elephant and Walworth Neighbourhood Forum (EWNF) to better understand the risks, challenges and opportunities MEBs are facing, and then work on policy recommendations to help ensure their survival and future development. To promote the interests of all residents and businesses in the OA, a neighbourhood plan is being promoted, supported by the work of the EWNF. The policy recommendations being developed with the assistance of this project may be included as part of this. This is especially timely as a new Southwark Council Plan is currently in consultation.
The entrance of the Elephant and Castle shopping centre
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ELEPHANT & CASTLE / WALWORTH
New Kent Rd
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Elephant & Castle and surrounding wards
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Business, commerce and retail • Elephant & Castle (E&C) is classed as a ‘major town centre’. Vacancy rates are low, with higher levels of convenience retail than comparison goods. • Walworth Rd is classed as ‘protected shopping frontage’. There is a higher level of comparison goods and low vacancy rates (4% at the 2011 Southwark Council Walworth Rd retail survey). • There is a high concentration of LatinoAmerican businesses and shops in the area, growing since the 1980s. • E&C is identified as a ‘cultural hub’ by the London Development Authority, with several significant venues: e.g. Coronet Cinema, Ministry of Sound, Southwark Playhouse. • There are two markets in the area, one at E&C shopping centre, one at East St which sells mostly food. • Availability of employment in E&C is good; 1.45 per working age resident, compared with 1.18 in Southwark as a whole and 0.9 in London. Strongest sectors are business services, professional, real estate, scientific and technical and public administration. • Start-ups of small-medium size businesses
Facilities • The area is convenient for public transport, being served by many buses, two underground stations and a national rail station. Improvements to the roundabout and tube station are planned by Transport for London. • The London College of Communication and London South Bank University are both located in the area.
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Location The ‘Opportunity Area’ (OA) as shown on the map below, falls within the wards of Borough and Bankside, Newington, Faraday and East Walworth. The populations in these wards are expected to double in size by 2029, according to Greater London Authority (GLA) projection. Demographic and baseline data: • There is a high proportion of people aged 10-29 in this area; • The two largest ethnic groups are ‘White British’ and ‘Black / Black British’; • Southwark is 41st in England out of 326 boroughs on the Index of Multiple Deprivation, with the Opportunity Area in the top 10% or 20% most deprived in the UK; • 13.7% of the working age population in the OA claim out-of-work benefits (Southwark Baseline Data, 2012); higher than the Southwark average.
to nB
(from the E&C SPD)
is high; Southwark council has completed a consultation exercise to identify what assistance SMEs in the area would prefer, however there is no specificity in this towards MEBs.
Ne wi ng
Background information The Opportunity Area
Bakers’ Arms Elephant and Castle
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MIGRANT AND ETHNIC BUSINESSES Definition of a ‘migrant and ethnic business’ (MEB) Turnstone (2004, p8) suggests four aspects that should be considered when defining a MEB: 1) the ownership and management of the business; 2) the ethnic mix of the staff; 3) the goods or service offered; 4) the customer base For the purposes of our survey, the factor chosen was the ownership of the business. Background Britain experienced an increase in immigration, from the early 1990s, until the introduction of a more restrictive immigration policy and the economic recession in 2008. As a result, there are now populations from every country in the world (Sepulveda et al., 2011, p. 470), comprising 8% of the UK population, 15% in London. (Ekwulugo, 2014). This new ‘superdiversity’ means that the previous understanding of Britain’s migrant and ethnic population, characterised by large communities of Afro-Caribbean and South Asian communities entering Britain in the 1950s and 1960s (Waldinger et al., p586), is now outdated. Originally, the emergence of ethnic businesses was linked to labour shortages in Western industrial societies. Immigrants initially took less skilled work. Once settled, many sought more profitable, higher skilled occupations, some pursuing selfemployment (Waldinger et al., p587, Struder, 2003, p11). Reasons for self-employment can be either ‘push’ reasons (lack of language skills, education not recognised in host country, discrimination) or ‘pull’ reasons such as cultural and family expectations and support, or a wish for upward mobility and entrepreneurship (Struder, I, 2003). According to ‘Supporting Entrepreneurial Diversity in Europe (EU, 2008, p.10) ethnic businesses are usually small, with few employees, low requirement for capital and skills (e.g. retail, convenience and
beauty services) (EU, 2008, commission, 2008, p10). Our study reflects this finding, with food/ convenience retail and beauty being two of the largest groups. Assumptions of socio-economic level should be treated with caution. Many newer migrants have professional qualifications and provide higherlevel services (Kloosterman et al, 1999, p32-33). For instance, the increasing worldwide transfer of money has become a multi-billion pound industry, with large companies such as Western Union and Moneygram- familiar names in our study areadominating the global market. Features of ethnic migrant businesses MEBs have varying degrees of ‘embeddedness’; levels of legal status, and access to public services. There is also an increase in ‘transnationalism’ways in which migrants maintain connections with their homeland. This is due to greater ease in worldwide communications and decreases in the cost of worldwide travel, shipping and economic transfers (Blackwell and Seddon, 2004, p4). These variations can present difficulties in finding data; with regards to our research, many of the businesses surveyed were not visible on a registered companies list- perhaps due to a change in company name. Also, nationally, grouping of financial data is not sorted by ethnicity, meaning that the contribution to the economy of ethnic businesses is not possible to assess accurately. Challenges Regeneration poses the following challenges to both ethnic and non-ethnic small businesses: • • •
Low resilience to external factors Threat of loss of premises or increase in rent / rates Loss of customers due to displacement of communities or competition from bigger stores
In addition, there are specific issues, for example: • Language barriers • Unfamiliarity with local policy context Successive governments in the New Labour era promoted policies to assist business creation amongst particular social groups.
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MIGRANT AND ETHNIC BUSINESS CLUSTERS A focus of much of this activity was the ‘Black and Minority Ethnic’ population, via the ‘Local Enterprise Growth Initiative’. Rationales for this were: boosting economic competitiveness, encouraging social inclusion, equal opportunities and community cohesion (Syrett and North, p485486, 2008). Many of these initiatives have now ended, and the situation of MEBs in the new postrecession economy poses new challenges and policy questions.
Business clusters: a possible solution? Advantages of clustering The cluster effect can be seen in any urban centre, as many commercial establishments tend to spontaneously group themselves by category. Clustering can lead to an economic advantage: a larger marketplace may attract more customers, smaller businesses may be able to provide services cheaper than larger companies, and, a more immediate need for income and reduced capital base can drive competitiveness. Clustering can be used to promote a particular place as good for a certain type of business. Examples where governments and companies have used this strategy are: 1. France, where the national industrial policy includes support for business clusters such as Cap Digital (Poles de Competitivité, 2013) 2. Greece, where the “Nano/Microelectronics and Embedded Systems” facilitated by “Corallia Cluster Initiative“ introduced a 3-phase programme for facilitating cluster development. For MEBs, clustering gives the additional benefit of creating networks between co-ethnic owners, employees and the local (host society) labour market. (Struder, 2003, p7). Advantages to the host economy from MEB clusters Guarnizo (2003, p683) summarises various ways in which MEBs can benefit the local economy: participation in the housing market, spending on goods and services in the UK and abroad, and contributions to taxation.
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In terms of employment opportunities, ethnic businesses do not always prefer to employ the same ethnicity. For instance in the study by Struder of businesses in Green Lanes Hackney (predominantly Turkish-owned) numerous jobs were generated for other nationalities. The socio-cultural aspect is significant. MEBs contribute to the 24-hour economy which not only provides vibrancy and atmosphere to the streets, but also ‘eyes on the street’. One example is of traders in Green Lanes, Stoke Newington joining forces to prevent damage to their businesses during the 2011 London riots (The Guardian, 9/8/2011). Migrant demands for certain goods also allow transnationalisation of items that would otherwise not have been economically viable; for instance Corona beer (Guarnizo, p 682, 2003) and, in our study area, the widespread use of some of the larger ethnic food stores. From this research it appears that clustering can be highly beneficial to MEBs. These clusters have the potential to be instrumental to regeneration, rather than a feature to be swept away. Our research aims to understand MEBs’ needs and identify existing clusters, to help understand how they can benefit the future Elephant and Walworth area.
THE NEW SOUTHWARK PLAN Southwark Council is in the process of reviewing the Southwark Plan (2007) and Core Strategy (2011) to prepare a local plan – the New Southwark Plan – which will set out a regeneration strategy for the borough. The plan will be adopted in 2018 and will be valid until 2033. It will be used to make decisions on planning applications for future regeneration, for instance: • protect, and attract businesses into, the borough to increase job opportunities; • support high streets and increase the range of shops to increase their vitality; • direct growth to certain areas of the borough, predominantly Elephant and Castle. The Council is currently undertaking a consultation process to inform the plan. An initial consultation called Let’s talk about your high streets was undertaken by questionnaire in 2014 to gather information on the public’s perception of high streets. The results of this informed the preparation of the New Southwark Plan Options version, which is currently awaiting feedback from the community in the form of another longer questionnaire and a series of public examinations. The study group attended the examination of the New Southwark Plan Options version held on the 9th of February 2015 for the Elephant & Castle and Walworth area. The consultation The consultation enjoyed a reasonably good attendance. The Council had prepared a set of questions- based on the 2014 consultationhowever, the meeting was run as an open discussion in which participants could raise concerns over the plan. Items raised by ‘Latin Elephant’ concerned migrant and ethnic economies and their opportunities in the area, particularly the lack of acknowledgement of said economies in the planning documents, and absence of dedicated benefits and specific measures to protect them. On the same note, a non-ethnic business owner expressed concern regarding increasing business rates and lack of reassurance of protection from the risks of gentrification.
The question of rising business rates was already raised in the 2014 consultation; however, the topic was dismissed as it was not under the remit of planning policy (The New Southwark Plan Interim Consultation Report, October 2014). A participant commented that the disparity between Southwark residents’ demographic and the businesses attracted to the area by regeneration might suggest that the current plan “is not encouraging the right kind of development”. Another participant suggested that research should be conducted on whether the job supply for people living in the area will benefit from the presence of new businesses. Finally, a participant speaking on behalf of a group of African-Caribbean business owners highlighted the role of these businesses in the area in strengthening both the local economy and the community. He lamented a lack of support by the Council, and suggested that many businesses would benefit from market research support by the Council. The Plan Ethnic diversity is mentioned only once in the New Southwark Plan Options Version in paragraph 39: “We will continue to support the local economy and protect and promote the ethnic and cultural diversity of Walworth Road during the period of substantial change as the regeneration programmes at the Elephant and Castle and the Aylesbury Estate take place”. This statement however is not supported by any specific policy regarding migrant and ethnic economies. It is therefore unclear how the Council intends to act in this respect. DM22 states that “planning permission will be granted for a range of uses in railway arches outside the preferred industrial locations to contribute to the local economy and provide low cost, flexible space for small businesses”. Railway arches are currently mostly occupied by ethnic and migrant businesses; along with preserving the variety of uses, policy could recognise the importance of preserving the variety of tenures and services provided. Paragraph 138 states the rise in jobs available 9
THE NEW SOUTHWARK PLAN (through regeneration) “may not directly benefit local people unless action is taken to reduce the barriers to employment experienced by much of the population”. The promotion of an “entrepreneurial approach to business” is cited as one of the objectives of the Economic Wellbeing Strategy (2012-20); the strategy however does not mention the fundamental role that ethnic businesses play in Southwark’s economic context; as emerged during the consultations, many ethnic start-up businesses would benefit from the dedicated support of the Council. Paragraph 157 expresses concerns regarding the loss of shopping frontages and neighbourhood shops, which are the only option to access food in some areas. Apart from meeting everyday needs, neighbourhood shops along the high streets surveyed are almost entirely ethnic businesses which provide specific products – often unavailable in supermarkets – to the local communities.
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EMPIRICAL RESEARCH Data Collection Methodology
The administered survey is based on Latin Elephant’s survey, conducted exclusively with Latin businesses in the same area. In agreement with Latin Elephant and the Neighbourhood Forum, the questions were adapted for multiple ethnicities. The first ‘quantitative’ part, gathering general data about the business, was augmented by ‘qualitative’ questions, aiming to assess the owner’s opinions on their situation and the chance for engagement with the Neighbourhood Forum (see appendix for survey). MEBs were understood as businesses owned by someone who was not ‘White British’. Therefore, we only surveyed independent shops avoiding, for instance, council shops and chain stores. Businesses surveyed are located in New and Old Kent Road, Walworth Road, East Street, Hampton Road, the Brandon Estate, Rodney Road and Bagshot Street.
Output Out of 307 shops, 20 owners were non-ethnic (White-British). From the remaining 287, we obtained data from 94 with 57 unwilling to participate and 119 not visited.(1) There is a high share of ‘Not visited’ as there were some shops, particularly on Walworth Road, which were always busy and therefore unwilling to be surveyed. Moreover, some shops were temporarily closed.
(1) ‘Not willing to participate ‘includes those who (1) do not wish to participate (2) those that we returned to multiple times and were never available to answer questions.
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EMPIRICAL RESEARCH Business Types The business types surveyed represent the high streets. However, as they were always very busy and unlikely to have the owner in, few money-related and beauty shops were surveyed.
Breakdown of business types UCL sample survey
Breakdown of business types All shops
Country of Origin
BVI
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Latin Elephant Sample size: 90 12
UCL and LE Using Latin Elephant’s data skews the result towards Latin America; to prevent this, the rest of the results are from the UCL survey only.
UCL survey Sample size: 94
As our data shows, there is no clear majority of ethnicities. While this reinforces the concept of an ‘ethnically diverse’ area, it might not facilitate the creation of policy on ethnic clusters.
EMPIRICAL RESEARCH Country of Origin - Business Types
Tech & Electronics Sample size = 6
Food/ Convenience retail Sample size = 29
Food consumption Sample size = 20
Evidence of clustering for certain business types (Asian in Tech & Electronics). Because the area is so ethnically diverse, there is a great variety in terms of food provision; the change in the customer base linked to regeneration is a possible threat to this variety, which should be regarded as an asset for the area. With regeneration I am aware the area is unfortunately going to change. What’s great now is the variety of food available, I can eat from a different country every day! - shop owner
Country of Origin - Location and Clustering
Old Kent Road East Street Market Walworth Road Evidence of clustering found in Old Kent Road and East Street Market, whereas Walworth Road reflected the diversity of our survey sample.
Walworth Road / East Street
Old Kent Road
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EMPIRICAL RESEARCH DOB, Arrival in the UK & Shop opening date DOB
Arrival
Shop opened
Majority of respondents born before 1981 (54 / 70%) 73% of businesses are owned by settled immigrants (people who arrived before 2000) Most shops have opened within the last 15 years (65%) showing quick turnaround
Time Lag
Year arrived in UK Year shop opened
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However, as most data given in ranges (rather than years), the gap can vary between 2 and 20 years.
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0
The graph shows a gap between the arrival in the UK and the start of a business.
19611970
19711980
19811990
19912000
20012010
20112015
Arrival in the UK vs. Region (UCL data)
Shop opening year vs. Region (UCL data)
Although Latin American immigration in the UK dates back to the 1960s, most shops surveyed by UCL were opened in the 2010s. More research is required to understand whether this is due to shop ownership elsewhere or a longer settling time. A large portion of the surveyed African and Middle Eastern owners arrived in the 1990s and opened shops relatively quickly.
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EMPIRICAL RESEARCH Number of Customers vs Business Type
Number of Customers 150+ 100-150 75-99 50-74 30-49 10-29 1-9
Mostly small, with 49 (59%) receiving less than 50 customers a day. High-customer volume shops are food and medical related businesses. This illustrates the importance of ethnically diverse shops as a source of basic services and food.
Mixing of Customers
Majority same ethnicity base Mixed
The business types that cater to the same ethnicity base are mainly food related - illustrating clearly the importance of MEBs to ethnic food provision for the local community. However, there is a concern with competition from large supermarket chains stocking ethnic foods. . Before, people had to come to my shop to buy these products, now the big supermarkets stock them - food retail shop owner
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EMPIRICAL RESEARCH When faced with a shifting customer base, possibly due to regeneration, food retail that caters mainly to certain ethnicities will be more affected; new policy should take this into account. There does not seem to be a correlation between the owner’s ethnicity and customer ethnicity base.
What languages do you speak? 56 (82%) of those surveyed spoke more than one language. The most spoken languages are Turkish, Urdu and French. Due to the ethnic diversity of the area, languages are considered an essential part of catering to the local community. I speak English, Hindu and Gujarat. But I hire French, Italian and Spanish speakers for the large South American and North African communities. - pharmacy owner
What does this shop mean to your customers? The variety of answers show the multifaceted benefits that these local businesses give to the community. It’s part of the community- we know our customers, so if they are in a hard place financially, we can negotiate the price a little or give credit for a few days. Big stores can’t do that - shop owner
We have a 98% customer satisfaction rating. -shop owner
This is the only pharmacy for half a mile so it’s important to this estate, especially as a self-care facility; it means less people need to go to their doctor or A&E. - pharmacy owner 16
EMPIRICAL RESEARCH Employee number There are roughly 509 employees working in the shops surveyed and an average of 6.2 employees per shop.(1) The majority are micro-enterprises (<10 employees). Food and convenience retail, food consumption and multi-businesses are the only types employing more than 15 people.
Amount of local residents
42% of business owners live locally. There is a limited correlation between country of origin and whether the owner lived locally, with a slightly lower share of Asian businesses.
What is the value of having your shop here?
Regardless of whether shop owners lived locally retaining existing shop location is important The reasons given are both economic (footfall) and social (community).
It is really important to have this shop here. There is a very large African population. They come from work tired, they do not want to cook, maybe they do not have a wife, or a husband, a family, so they come here. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s like other take aways, but for Africans. There is a high demand for this in the area. - restaurant owner
(2) 83 shop shared employee numbers - 67 of them in form of a range. Total estimated from taking midpoint of range.
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EMPIRICAL RESEARCH What does this shop mean to you? For most people ‘livelihood’ and ‘job’ are key words. Income as provision for their family, rather than themselves, was a recurrent theme.
How do you think regeneration will impact you? Overall shop regeneration.
owners
are
positive
about
The reasons that some owners feel threatened may be their location (East Street Market over Old Kent Road), their business type (catering to a shifting customer base) or their ethnicity.
Regeneration would be bad if it meant higher rents... But I don’t think it will happen soon in Old Kent Road - it is more a problem in New Kent Road - Old Kent Road Shop owner
Regeneration can be daunting. The council does not consider black businesses. African businesses have to pay high taxes, as high as other ethnic minorities that are already established in the area
Development of surrounding areas have taken customers away from the street. Since the housing has been removed, less people pass through, stalls decrease and the shops are also influenced. - East Street shop owner
The problem will be if new people moving in are not Baltic then they will not buy from my store - Ethnic Food Retail owner
- restaurant owner
How can the Neighbourhood forum help you? The variety of business needs can be seen in the answers to ‘what could the neighbourhood forum do for you’. Economic issues (business rates), social issues (security, shifting customer base), location issues (parking) were all raised. This shows that MEBs cannot be treated as a unified set of businesses.
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WHAT NEXT? Recommendations for Policy Research and possible Policy Interventions The survey included some specific comments regarding concerns for the future: • • •
Rising rent and business rates Supermarkets taking away trade Customer base moving away due to demolition of council homes
MEBs generally rely less on formal help and advice; more on informal networks. For instance, they are more likely to approach family and friends for finance. (Supporting Entrepreneurial Diversity in Europe, 2008, p10). Given the results of our qualitative surveys stressing the importance of MEBs for the local community, one tactic would be, following Kloosterman’s work on the influence of social capital (2010), to promote these networks through regulation. Social capital can be understood as the development potential of networks, as it “arises because of dense interactions between social actors who create … networks around themselves” (Barros and Nunes 2008, p. 155). However, social capital is related to context. The concept of ‘mixed embeddedness’ as reviewed by Kloosterman (2010) aims to identify this context as wider than the ethnic network and its immediate surroundings. Kloosterman identifies three concentric spheres of influence: 1. The ethnic networks that can both nurture and restrain a business’s development; 2. The opportunity structure: a wider horizon that MEBs have difficulties accessing due to market competition from bigger and established smaller firms; 3. The politico-legal regulation: legislative decisions that determine what entrepreneurs can or cannot do, and can limit the access to entrepreneurship for certain categories of people. As Jones et al. (2014) point out, although Britain’s neo-liberal economy is well known for its support to new migrant enterprise (Kloosterman, 2010, p502), its lack of regulation benefits quantity over quality. As a result, firms tend to compete over price rather than over service, remaining stuck in the same business categories that characterised post-
war migrant entrepreneurship: low-order retailing, catering and personal services, as representative of our study area. With this premise, the solution seems to be to act on the third sphere of influence, making sure that migrant and ethnic entrepreneurs are able to access increased resources. This lays the foundation on which MEBs can flourish, making the most of the increased social capital connected to business clusters and networking. Jones et al. (2014) point out that along with the vulnerability of being new comes racial discrimination: “racialised minorities cannot simply be viewed as constrained entrepreneurs... [They] are excluded in ways not applicable to members of the indigenous majority population” (p.516). It therefore appears crucial to devise a specific support strategy for MEBs, that takes into account the cultural differences and specific barriers that migrant entrepreneurs encounter. In 2003 the London Chamber of Commerce (LCC) published a paper which listed some organisations that offered advice specifically for MEBs, for example Business Link for London, the Ethnic Minority Business forum, Go East, and one council (Greenwich). Of these, two are no longer active, and two now provide ‘sector specific business support’. However, no mention is made of ethnicity as a factor driving types of assistance available. For instance, ‘Hackney Business Venture’ describes itself as ‘a Local Enterprise Hub, starting funding and growing business’. The ‘Client Success Stories’ show several examples that may be ‘ethnic/migrant businesses’, however none referred to as such. One relevant example based on a practical programme comes from overseas: the work of the Metcalfe Foundation in Greater Toronto (Wayland, 2011).The ‘Inclusive Local Economies Programme’ is funded by Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC). Training programs focus on specific immigrant populations such as women and younger people. The courses differ from general business courses by paying specific attention to professional etiquette and culture. Students are encouraged to speak in front of the class and receive feedback on their 19
WHAT NEXT? business plans and marketing materials. The “value added” in this program is the increased focus on Canadian norms and expectations. (Wayland, 2011) The LCC paper makes recommendations on how to assist MEBs. Considering this paper, the EU paper ‘Supporting Entrepreneurial Diversity in Europe’, and our empirical research, we make the following recommendations for research into future policy development for tailoring support for MEBs: •
•
• • •
• •
• • •
•
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Tailor assistance to the needs of the business, as needs vary according to level of income, whether the subject is in receipt of benefits, and the level of economic formality and embeddedness. Research into the level of business skills could identify shortfalls, for instance smaller businesses are less likely to have a formal business plan. Research into stakeholders, and the challenges faced, will assist further understanding. Consider the delivery of support. Services taking place at or near to the business location are more likely to be used. This can take the form of networking: for instance legal or financial advice- as MEBs are more likely to accept and act on advice from those of the same ethnicity. For instance, ‘connect legal’ in Toronto pairs low-resource migrant entrepreneurs with lawyers willing to donate free time (Wayland, 2011). If employing coaches, consider the value of employing some of the same ethnicity as the groups targeted. Creative space solutions such as co-ops and shared commercial space can help with cost issues; lower risk loan products such as micro-financing, investment clubs and local capital lending are also worth investigating. Networks can improve local capacity to create more resilience in the local economy. Delivering support through larger general support structures may increase resilience of the services. Consider encouraging mainstream businesses to develop ‘supplier diversity programmes’ to increase business-to-business purchasing from MEBs. Research into the awareness of administrations and other stakeholders (e.g. banks) of MEBs’
• • •
contribution to the general economy, could help identify perception issues that could pose challenges. Support services should empower, not create dependency. Consider that fees can pose a significant acceptance barrier. Continue the exchange of good practices: communication between advocates and networks.
Lastly whilst undertaking the survey, the group felt that there was a low level of awareness of the EWNF. We recommend that future research includes a planned awareness-raising exercise through a variety of marketing methods, as well as via future research.
APPENDIX
APPENDIX - Other Graphs Gender
Majority of owners are men, with women owners concentrated in Beauty & Wellbeing and food related businesses.
Continent of Origin
Including Latin Elephant data Sample Size: 505
Including Latin Elephant data Sample Size: 94
Overall, for shops known, there is a high proportion of Latin Americans. However, when Latin Elephant data is taken out the majority is Asian.
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APPENDIX - Methodology Surveys The surveys were carried out by the 6 members of our group, each returning to the area at least three times in February 2015. Shops were entered and the employee was asked if the owner was present or if they were comfortable answering for the owner. If the owner/ employee did not consider themselves/ the owner to have any international heritage, and answered yes to the question are you/ they ‘White British’? we did not carry out the survey. A big challenge was that shops were unlikely to have the owner present, and so unwilling to answer the survey. In this case we often left the survey, but after returning to the shop multiple times, the owner was unlikely to have filled it in.
Shops categorised by business type The survey was based on a list of shops provided by Latin Elephant, that could be integrated and corrected during the fieldwork. For shops surveyed, if the list was mistaken we would correct the description based on what the primary source of business appeared to be. When researching a more efficient way of classifying the shop types, we considered Land Use Classes as established by the Town and Country Planning Use Classes Order (1987, amended). However, some concerns were raised during the New Southwark Plan consultation attended in February regarding the possibility of a change of use between betting shops and banks, both belonging to the Use Class A2, and how this would allow more betting shops to open in the area. We concluded that using the Land Use Classes would have obscured a great deal of detail, affecting the precision of the study. For instance, Land Use Class A1 includes shops, retail warehouses, hairdressers, undertakers, travel and ticket agencies, post offices, pet shops, cold food takeaways, showrooms, domestic hire shops, dry cleaners, funeral directors and internet cafes; while from a planning perspective these shops may be similar, their owners and customers, their ethnicities and experiences are likely to be really different - we 24
did not want to compromise these aspects of our research. Ultimately, we agreed upon having our own set of uses, based on our experience of the variety of businesses in the study area. The classification is as follows: 1. Beauty & Wellbeing 2. Betting, Money transfer, pawnbrokers (These shops were assigned their own category. It is important to notice that, especially in the case of money transfers, the businesses tended to be grouped with other shops) 3. Clothes & Jewellery 4. Community, Charity and Charity Shops 5. Food and convenience retail (This use includes all premises where food is to be bought but not consumed, including shops to meet the day-today needs). 6. Food consumption (This use includes all premises where food is to be bought and consumed and take-aways) 7. Furniture, DIY, Homeware 8. Hotel 9. Medical Services (includes pharmacies, doctors, opticians etc.) 10. Multi-business (As mentioned, sometimes one space hosted more businesses and activities, sometimes with one owner running different businesses, sometimes with multiple owners sharing a space. We recorded this clustering as “multi-business”). 11. Residential 12. Services 13. Tailoring & Dry Cleaning 14. Tech & Electronics The categories represent the apparent primary source of busienss so if there was a restaurant which also sold packaged food, we considered it as food consumption.For the multi-business category, we have identified this as a common attitude. The survey response rate from multi-business owners was insufficient to recognise any trends, but we feel this is one area which would require additional research, especially on the tendency of specific businesses or ethnicities to share a space, and on the mechanisms that regulate the sharing of a space.
APPENDIX - Methodology Recategorisation For shops surveyed, if the description was wrong (eg. hairdresser/ money-transfer when the hairdresser had closed down) we re-labelled this in the spreadsheet.
Country of origin Respondents were asked at first their ethnicity/ nationality. Initially many respondents answered British , and so more probing was required to find out where else they had heritage from. Respondents were also asked where were they born. To this question, many gave city or region-specific answers. For clarity of the graph we simplified this to country. The graphs do not show responses to the question ‘what is your ethnicity?’ as this illicited mostly hybrid answers eg. “Swedish/Ethiopian, British/Indian.
Year questions (DOB, Arrival in UK, shop opening) and customer, employee no. Respondents were asked to either give the specific number, or the range, in answer to these questions. Often, due to time-constraints or reasons of privacy, ranges were given. Due to this, the data has been shown as ranges.
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APPENDIX - Survey ! Elephant!&!Walworth!Neighbourhood!Forum! Introductory*statement:*Hello*my*name*is*[first*name*only*but*have*ID*visible]*and*I*am*a*student*at*UCL,* researching*migrant*and*ethnic*businesses*for*the*Elephant*and*Walworth*Neighbourhood*forum*which*is* comprised*of*both*local*residents*and*businesses.*This*research*will*be*used*to*support*the*rights*of*existing*businesses*who*wish* to*remain*in*the*area.*Would*you*be*able*to*spend*a*few*minutes*answering*some*questions*please?*** * You*agree*for*all*information*collected*to*be*used*for*the*purpose*stated*above.*____** The*information*gathered*will*be*shared*with*the*neighbourhood*forum,*any*reports*produced*for*the*public*will*not*mention*your* business*without*your*permission*(tick*if*name*can!be*used)*____* 1.*Name*of*Business*_______________________________________________________________________________* 2.*Business*Type**____________________________________________________________________________* 3.*Trading*Address*_________________________________________________________________________________* ________________________________________________________________________________________________* 4.*Contact*Person*&*Position*_________________________________________________________________________* 5.*Gender*___________________* 6.*Ethnicity*and/or*Nationality*________________________________________________* 7.*What*are*the*first*three*letters*of*the*postcode*of*where*you*live?*_______________________________________* 8.*Birth*Year,*or*if*you*prefer,*choose*range*below:*_________________* **1940^1950***
**1951^1960**
1961^1970***
1971^1980*
1981^1990*
9.*Birth*Place*
*____________________________________________*(If*not*UK,*go*to*Q9,*if*UK*skip*
10.*When*Arrived:*(if*not*exact*date*then*range)* ******!*1960s* *!*1970s** !1980s** !1990s***
!2000* *
!After*2010*
11.*Business*opening*Date*or*Year:**Exact*Date*if*Known:*_________________________* !*Before*1970s**!*1970s** !*1980s* !*1990s* !*2000s* 12.*Number*of*Employees:* !*1^5** !*6^10* *
*!*11^15*
13.*Approximate*customers*per*day*–**RANGE* !*0^10**!10^30** !*30^50*
!*Since*2010*
!*16^30*
!*31^50*
!*51^75***
!*75+*
!*50^75*
!*75^100*
!*100^150***
!150+14.**
14.*Ethnicity*of*customers*–***!*Majority*same*ethnicity*base*(as*owner)*****!*Only*same*ethnicity*base*******!*Mixed* 15.*What*Languages*do*you*speak?**________________________________________________* Part!II:!Qualitative!questions!:*
* * *
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1. What*does*this*shop*mean*to*you?* * 2. What*do*you*think*this*shop*means*to*your*customers?* * 3. What*is*the*value*of*having*your*shop*here?* 4. What*will*be*the*impact*on*you*of*Southwark*Council’s*plans*to*regenerate*the*Elephant*&*Castle*&*Walworth?* 5. What*do*you*need*to*know/*what*kinds*of*support*would*be*useful*for*you?* 6. Would*you*like*to*join/*know*more*about*the*neighbourhood*forum
BIBLIOGRAPHY AND SOURCES Beaumont P, Coleman J, Laville S (2011) London riots: ‘People are fighting back. It’s their neighbourhoods at stake’ The Guardian [online] http://www.theguardian. com/uk/2011/aug/09/london-riots-fightingneighbourhoods Accessed 27/2/2015 Blackwell M, Seddon D (2004) Informal remittances from the UK: Values, flows and mechanisms - Norwich overseas development group, Report to DFID. [online] http://www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/sites/files/ migobs/Briefing%20-%20Migrant%20Remittances_0.pdf Accessed 3/3/2015 Ekwulugo F N (2014) Ethnic Minority Businesses: Challenges and Agenda for Research. Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship [online] http://www.isbe.org.uk/ethnicminoritybusinesses Accessed 30/2/2015 European Commission, Enterprise and Industry Directorate-General (2008) Supporting Entrepreneurial Diversity in Europe- Ethnic Minority Entrepreneurship Guarnizo L E (2003) The Economics of Transnational Living’; International Migration Review 37 (3): 666-699 Hackney Business Venture [online] http://www.hbv.org. uk/whowework.html Accessed 13/3/2015 Jones T, Ram M, Edwards P, Kiselinchev A, Muchenje L (2014) Mixed embeddedness and new migrant enterprise in the UK. Entrepreneurship & Regional Development: An International Journal 26 (5-6): 500520 Kloosterman R, Van Leun J, Rath J (1999) Mixed embeddedness: (In)formal economic activities and immigrant businesses in the Netherlands; International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 23(2): 252-266 Kloosterman R (2010) Matching Opportunities with Resources: A Framework for Analysing (Migrant) Entrepreneurship from a Mixed Embeddedness Perspective; Entrepreneurship and Regional Development 22 (1): 25–45 Les Poles de Competitivité [online] http://competitivite. gouv.fr/home-903.html Accessed 1/3/2015 Logan J R, Alba R D, McNulty T L (1994) Ethnic economies in Metropolitan Regions: Miami and Beyond. Social Forces 72: 691-724
London Borough Southwark Planning Policy Team (2011) Elephant and Castle Supplementary Planning document - Baseline Information [online] http://www.southwark.gov.uk/download/downloads/ id/7058/baseline_information_background_paper Accessed 22/3/2015 London Chamber of Commerce and Industry (2003) Ethnic minorities Information Centre Guide [online] http://www.londonchamber.co.uk/docimages/149.pdf Accessed 13/3/2015 Mayor of London (2014) Further Alterations to the London Plan (FALP) [online] https://www.london.gov. uk/sites/default/files/FALP%20ITP%20clean%2015%20 December%202014.pdf Accessed 17/3/2015 Omidvar R, Houston S, Lopes S, Murphy C (2011) Key Takeaways form These Discussions [online] http:// maytree.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/LetterEntrepreneurship-report_final_August2012.pdf Accessed 13/3/2015. Sepulveda L, Lyon F and Syrett S (2011) Refugee, new arrivals and enterprise: Their contributions and constraints [online] http://www.mdx.ac.uk/www/ceedr Accessed 22/3/2015 Struder I R (2003) Do concepts of ethnic economies explain existing minority enterprises? The Turkish speaking economies in London. Research Papers in Environmental and Spatial Analysis Series 88 Syrett S, North D (2010) Between Economic Competitiveness and Social Inclusion: New Labour and the Economic Revival of Deprived Neighbourhoods. Local Economy 25 (5-6): 476-493 Turnstone research and consultancy Ltd (2004)Ethnic minority small businesses qualitative research report. [online] http://www.acas.org.uk/media/pdf/d/q/Ethnic_ minority_small_businesses_2004_1.pdf Accessed 30/2/2015 Vertovec S (2007) Super-diversity and its Implications Ethnic and Racial Studies 30 (6): 10241054 Waldinger R, Ward R, Aldrich H (1985) Trend Report: Ethnic Business and Occupational Mobility in Advanced Societies. Sociology 19(4) Wayland S (2011) Immigrant Self-Employment and Entrepreneurship in the GTA: Literature, Data, and Program Review [online] http://maytree.com/policyand-insights/publications/maytree-metcalf-foundationrelease-new-report-on-immigrant-entrepreneurship. html 22/3/2015 Photographs: taken by the group 27