Bibliographie sélective OHADA

International Investment Agreements seek to promote foreign investment whilst protecting foreign investors. Despite the goal of International Investment Agreements being to secure parity between the interests of the host State and the foreign investor, there has been consequential disparity in the protection of the interests of both parties. Notably, the host State is susceptible to disadvantage. This research examines the extent to which International Investment Agreements in Tanzania have facilitated this disparity. In particular, the research evaluates the inclusion of fair and equitable treatment provisions in Tanzania’s International Investment Agreements and the extent to which fair and equitable treatment provisions have in some way facilitated this disparity. The research examines systematically the fair and equitable treatment provisions contained in twenty IIAs signed by Tanzania between 1965 and 2013 (eleven of which are still in force). The research takes a comparative approach in evaluating and contrasting the Tanzanian provisions with other fair and equitable treatment clauses in IIAs signed by India, Morocco and the Netherland. The Tanzanian provisions are vague and non-uniform in comparison. The research is situated in the broader context of national sovereignty and the relationship between Tanzania and its foreign investors under international law. The substance of the analysis centres on foreign investors in the mining sector in Tanzania and the extent to which these investors have sought to take advantage of the fair and equitable treatment clauses in the IIAs in order to pursue their activities to the detriment of local populations. The research evidences the negative impact of their claims that changes in government policy (often aimed at benefiting citizens) amount to unfair treatment of the foreign investor. This has a significant impact on the ability of the government to develop its policies around sustainable development, environmental protection and the guarantee of human rights of the citizens of the host State. The research demonstrates that a clearer and fuller articulation of fair and equitable treatment clauses within Tanzania’s IIAs can act as a corrective to the disparity between the host State and the international investor. This requires that IIAs are drafted to include an exhaustive and full list of the State’s obligations towards the foreign investor so as to limit foreign investor claims against the host State. The impact of not doing so has grave implications for the rights of the citizens of Tanzania and unnecessarily tips the balance of power in favour of the foreign investor and away from the host State. This undermines the ability of the host State to assert its sovereignty within its own borders.

La thèse porte sur les rapports entre l’investissement dans la conception d’objets immatériels et la propriété intellectuelle. Elle interroge la vocation du droit de la propriété intellectuelle à la protection d’un tel investissement. À l’examen du droit positif, il n’est pas aisé d’identifier une réponse claire à cette question.L’existence de la protection est incertaine, alors même que la technique employée est adéquate. Discutée, elle mérite d’être repensée. Son avenir dépend par ailleurs de son caractère souhaitable, et donc de sa légitimité. Aussi, pour être effective, la protection doit faire l’objet d’un choix politique de société. Proposantune lecture de la propriété intellectuelle sous l’angle de sa finalité de protection de l’investissement, l’étude est menée à l’appui de la construction d’un concept juridique d’investissements immatériels. Celle-ci permet de présenter le sujet et ses problématiques de façon renouvelée, afin de dépasser les difficultés. Le résultat de l’exercice de conceptualisation, conjugué à un exercice de classification juridique de la réalité, sert de base à un essai de reconstruction prospective du système juridique de la propriété intellectuelle. Les catégories, qualifications et régimes de ce dernier sont réaménagés, pour le faire évoluer en équilibre et cohérence, vers une fonction assumée de protection de l’investissement. L’enjeu est d’aboutir à un système de protection légitime, sécurisant et fidèle à la réalité et ses attentes.

The States, international organizations and interest groups are increasingly concerned with treaty claims of foreign investors, who sometimes seek compensation for the States' legitimate regulatory measures, such as tobacco plain packaging, nuclear energy phase out and environmental regulations. International investment law has yet to develop a comprehensive and predictable framework addressing some of the basis questions related to compensability of legitimate regulatory measures. The thesis carries out a comparative legal analysis to identify the key features of the prohibition of uncompensated expropriation as a general principle of law, and explores the rationale of that principle in political philosophy. Equipped with the results of this analysis, it proceeds to propose an analytical approach addressing practical questions related to the compensatory protection of foreign investments.

This paper analyzes the protection of Foreign Direct Investments in the OHADA area, specifically, its regulation by the Treaty of Organization and Harmonization in Africa of Business Law (OHADA Treaty). It is to restore legal and judicial security within their scope that OHADA member countries have undertaken to harmonize and unify their economic sector legislation to attract foreign investment as a factor in economic development. Several national and international legal instruments are responsible for the protection of foreign direct investment in OHADA countries. Indeed, the volume of foreign direct investment (FDI) to developing countries increased considerably during the 1990s; As Africa is now one of the favorite destinations for Western and even African investors, it is becoming a very profitable continent for investors. However, the issue of regulating or securing foreign investment in African countries is still flawed. The establishment of OHADA, in a way, is in the same direction; if we stick to the purpose of the organization prescribed in paragraph 5 of the preamble to the OHADA Treaty, which states that the purpose of the OHADA law is to "promote the growth of economic activity and encourage investment." Unfortunately, this objective remains only an announcement of the preamble to the Treaty, because of the definition of business law given by Article 2 of that treaty. However, the list of subjects is not exhaustive, investment remains absent. Thus, foreign investment is not regulated by the OHADA Treaty, so even investment-related activities are held by other subjects (corporate law, commercial law, and security law). The omission of FDI in the scope of the OHADA Treaty leads us to raise the question of its regulation.This work proposes a reflection that the OHADA Treaty should be modernized through reform including investment and many other issues to deal effectively with the issue of foreign investment given the ineffectiveness of national and sub-regional instruments in this area.

The attributability of actions to states within the context of investment treaty disputes and to focus on the roles played by international and domestic laws in such attributions have caught the attention of jurists in recent years. The ILC Draft Articles on Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts, and particularly, article 3 points to the main outcome of this debate, where it does not consider domestic law irrelevant in internationally wrongful acts and stipulates that the issue is subject to international law and it will take into account the relevance of domestic law. Thus, although the characterization of an act of a State as internationally wrongful is an independent function of international law and such characterization is not affected by the characterization of the same act as lawful by domestic law, it does not mean that domestic law is irrelevant to such description; on the contrary, it may be related in various ways. The present article attempts to examine the challenging junction of domestic and international law with regard to the attributability of actions taken within the framework of investment treaties, specifically by state-owned and para-statal entities that exercise elements of state authority. قابلیت انتساب عمل به دولت در چارچوب اختلافات معاهده‌ سرمایه‌گذاری و تمرکز بر نقش‌هایی که حقوق بین‌الملل و حقوق داخلی در چنین انتسابی ایفا ‌می‌نمایند در زمره‌ مباحثی است که در سال‌های اخیر بسیار مورد ‌توجه حقوقدانان بوده و ماده 3 مواد کمیسیون حقوق بین‌الملل در ارتباط با مسئولیت دولت‌ها نیز بیانگر پیامد اصلی این بحث است که فی‌الواقع، حقوق داخلی را با مسأله متخلفانه بودن اعمال از حیث بین‌المللی بی‌ارتباط تلقی ‌ننموده، بلکه مقرر ‌می‌دارد مسئله مورد بحث، تابع حقوق بین‌الملل است لیکن حقوق بین‌الملل نیز خود تا حدِ ارتباط، حقوق داخلی را در نظر خواهد گرفت. بنابراین اگرچه توصیف خصوصیات یک عمل به عنوان عملی غیرقانونی از عملکردهای مستقل حقوق بین‌الملل است که تحت ‌تأثیر توصیف خصوصیات این عمل بموجب حقوق داخلی قرار نمی‌گیرد لیکن این گفته بدین معنی نیست که حقوق داخلی با توصیف عمل متخلفانه‌ بین‌المللی بی‌ارتباط ‌است؛ بالعکس، ممکن ‌است به طرق مختلفی به آن مرتبط‌ باشد. در این مقاله سعی بر‌ آن است که تلاقی چالش‌برانگیز حقوق داخلی و حقوق بین‌الملل در بحث قابلیت انتساب اعمال ‌صورت ‌گرفته در چارچوب معاهدات سرمایه‌گذاری توسط ارگان‌های دولتی و نهادهای نیمه‌دولتی که عناصر اختیارات دولتی را اعمال می‌نمایند مورد واکاوی قرار‌ گیرد.

Patents are considered as investments protected under the International Investment Law. Although, these properties are protected under the principle of territoriality, similar to other investments, they can be expropriated as a result of host states’ regulatory measures inconsistent with protection standards stemming from foreign investment protection regulations and treaties including fair and equitable treatment and legitimate expectations of foreign investors. Considering the fact that few arbitration awards have been issued by arbitration panels in this regard, it is yet difficult to claim there is a strong precedent in International Investment Law. Nevertheless, reflecting the provisions of international regulations, the stance of the domestic law and the most important relevant case, this article provides the most significant elements of indirect expropriation as well as existing doctrines in this respect and further investigates whether invalidation of patents can amount to indirect expropriation. It will also be mentioned that despite the fact that according to several foreign investment protection treaties, invalidation of patents shall not be subject to regulations regarding indirect or creeping expropriation, the final determination lies with the arbitration panel. یکی از مصادیق سرمایه‌گذاری خارجی مورد حمایت در حقوق بین‌الملل سرمایه‌گذاری، اختراعات است. این دسته از دارایی‌ها علی‌رغم به رسمیت شناخته شدن در پرتو اصل سرزمینی بودن حمایت، همانند سایر سرمایه‌گذاری‌ها می‌توانند تحت تدابیر حاکمیتی دول میزبان که مغایر با استانداردهای حمایتی نشأت گرفته از قوانین و معاهدات بین‌المللی حمایت از سرمایه‌گذاری خارجی همچون شرط رفتار عادلانه و منصفانه و صیانت از انتظارات مشروع و معقول سرمایه‌گذار می‌باشند، با خطراتی همچون سلب مالکیت مواجه شوند. نظر به صدور آرای معدود مراجع بین‌المللی در این خصوص، سخن گفتن از شکل‌گیری رویه‌ای متقن در این راستا دشوار می‌باشد. با این حال، در این نوشتار ضمن بررسی مهمترین عناصر متشکله سلب مالکیت غیرمستقیم و دکترین‌های موجود در این زمینه، به بررسی قابلیت تطبیق ابطال گواهی ثبت اختراع با سلب مالکیت غیرمستقیم پرداخته و با تشریح مقررات برخی اسناد بین‌المللی، موضع حقوق داخلی و مهم‌ترین پرونده مربوط به این موضوع در حقوق سرمایه‌گذاری خارجی در ابعاد گوناگون آن مداقه نموده و در نهایت به این نتیجه خواهیم رسید که حتی در صورت مستثنی نمودن ابطال گواهی ثبت اختراع از مقررات مربوط به سلب مالکیت در معاهدات حمایت از سرمایه‌گذاری خارجی، تشخیص نهایی تحقق سلب مالکیت با دیوان داوری است.

Le principe de proportionnalité a été récemment reconnu dans les traités et les accords internationaux du commerce et des investissements avec l’État. Cependant, peu d'études se concentrent sur la nature juridique, le contenu, la portée et les fonctions de ce principe dans le droit économique international. Cette thèse présente une analyse actuelle et détaillée sur ces questions.

Le présent rapport prône l’adoption de mesures de lutte contre la COVID concernant tout particulièrement la politique d’investissement soutenue par l’Accord portant création de la Zone de libre-échange continentale africaine afin de préserver les acquis du marché commun pour les entreprises et les citoyens africains et d’accroître les avantages en découlant. La Zone de libre-échange continentale africaine (ZLECAf) contribuera à générer les ressources financières nécessaires au développement économique de l’Afrique. Elle a pour objet de mettre en place un marché africain intégré où les biens, les personnes, les services et les capitaux circulent librement, complétant les efforts d’intégration régionale au profit des 1,3 milliard d’habitants du continent. Le produit intérieur brut combiné du marché de la ZLECAf est de 2 500 milliards de dollars. Elle a officiellement vu le jour le 21 mars 2018 à Kigali, date à laquelle 44 États membres de l’Union africaine ont signé l’Accord portant création de la Zone de libre-échange continentale africaine. L’Accord est entré en vigueur le 30 mai 2019 après le dépôt de l’instrument de ratification par le 22ème État membre de l’UA. La ZLECAf est entrée dans sa phase opérationnelle en juillet 2019. Les échanges régis par les règles de la ZLECAf ont débuté le 1er janvier 2021.

This work aims to find a practical solution to the problem that exists between intra-EU Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs) and European Union (EU) law over conflict of jurisdiction issues. Currently, there is a problem as the EU Commission has rendered intra-EU BITs incompatible with EU law. This work argues that the current conflict of jurisdictional problems within investment agreements can be overcome by the creation of an EU investment court. The reliance on this court for the resolution of this conflict, as opposed to private law mechanisms, is important as it is the way forward in handling the conflict of jurisdiction issue at its best. This work argues that an EU investment court will be a panacea to the current problems concerning the conflict of jurisdiction. These problems will be presented through a positivist method where the law is analysed in its current form, highlighting its current weaknesses and resolving these weaknesses by proposing recommendations for such a court through a comparative examination of other international courts that fulfil a similar dispute resolution function, namely the Organisation for the Harmonisation of Business Law in Africa (OHADA) and the Unified Patent Court (UPC) and the World Trade Organisation (WTO). The purpose of this work is manifold. The work will provide an analytical examination of the relationship between EU law and international obligations within intra-EU BITs. It will further explore and assess the viability of a range of alternative solutions to intra EU BITs enforcement within the EU. It will additionally examine the operation of the OHADA, the UPC and the WTO to inform the proposal of an EU investment court. This is important as the outcome of these examinations will support the argument made in this thesis. It will also impact dispute resolution beyond academia by providing a practical solution to alleviate the current challenges with intra-EU BITs. The recommendations thus can inform changes for lex ferenda.

Responsible investment (RI) is the investment strategy that incorporates environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors into the investment decision-making process (Hebb, Hawley, Hoepner, Neher, & Wood, 2015). RI has shifted from what was considered a niche market to become one of the fastest-growing areas of finance in many parts of the world (PRI, 2019b). However, a closer look at the development of RI and adoption rates in countries and regions reveals that RI is not commonly practised in sub-Sahara Africa (except for South Africa). This study explores the critical challenges for RI development in the retirement benefits sector of Kenya and, by engaging with a variety of key stakeholders, proposes how to overcome the identified challenges. It contributes to the literature on challenges for RI in a developing country by offering an in-depth case study of the retirement benefits sector.My study employs qualitative methods to collect and analyse data collected from semi-structured interviews with 22 participants (asset managers, regulators and capital market experts, and a council member of the Association of Retirement Benefits Schemes of Kenya) as well as a collection of published documents by government agencies in Kenya. Also, I analysed 10 annual reports to assess the kind of ESG information that is disclosed by listed companies. My study explores, in particular, how actors in the retirement benefits sector conceptualise RI. It identifies the leading ESG factors in Kenya and draws on the business-case approach to RI to explore whether the participants consider those factors as material risk factors that present both risks and opportunities to the investment decision-making process. Further, my study identifies the specific barriers for RI development and proposes how to overcome them. The findings show that participants define RI using several terminologies. This is consistent with the existing literature. My study finds that all participants consider corporate governance as a material risk factor that can impact the financial returns of a portfolio. However, most of the asset managers do not think that the environmental and social factors can present material risk factors to their investment decision-making process. Although over a third of the asset managers recognise that the environmental and social issues in Kenya present business opportunities to retirement benefits schemes, there is a shortage of well-structured assets in those areas. Further, this study identifies five specific barriers for RI development: diversification challenges; a lack of ESG data; a lack of demand/incentives; short-termism; and the demand for high financial returns and a lack of awareness and expert knowledge of RI practices. My study recommends that the National Treasury of Kenya develops RI policy for the entire finance sector. In addition, the findings support a recommendation for the Capital Markets Authority and the Retirement Benefits Authority to embark on capacity building programmes to educate the actors in the finance sector on RI strategies and to create awareness of the impact of ESG on financial returns in the long run.

OHADA bölgesindeki yabancı yatırımların yasal korunması bahassederken yasal mekanizmaların varlığı fikrine atıfta bulunur. Yabancı yatırımlarının korunmasının sağlanması Bu Örgüte üye olmayan ülkelerin vatandaşları. Mukayese arama sürecinde Türk hukuku ile anlayışlı olmalıdır. Bu yatırımlar için optimal yasal güvenlik modeli olmalidir çünkü OHADA yasa nispeten yeni ve yapım aşamasındadır. Talking about the legal protection of foreign investments in the OHADA zone inevitably refers to the idea of the existence of legal mechanisms capable of ensuring the protection of investments of economic operators who are nationals of non-member countries of this Organization. The comparison with Turkish law must to be understanding in the process of seeking the model of optimal legal security for these investments, because the OHADA law remains relatively new and under construction.

In recent years, investment arbitration tribunals are increasingly confronted with allegations of corruption, mostly invoked by host States as a defense to investors’ claims. After an affirmative finding of an alleged corrupt act between the investor and a public official of the host State in the establishment or conduct of the investment, tribunals have adopted a binary approach to the issue – if they uphold allegations of corruption, they completely dismiss the investor’s submissions. This binary approach has resulted in an asymmetry of liability for the two parties to a corrupt act (i.e., investors and host States/host State officials), failing to take into account the inherent bilateralism of corruption and the fact that domestic laws and international norms have outlawed both the act of offering and of accepting bribes. In particular, public officials’ free participation in a corrupt act to advance investments is attributable to the host State and requires State responsibility under international law. Moreover, the increasingly prevalent practice of inserting anti-corruption provisions in investment treaties has reinforced this lop-sided feature, as well as offering only weak effectiveness in terms of deterring corruption. After a careful examination of the treatment of corruption issues in investment arbitration and investment treaties, this thesis proposes a paradigm shift from the current asymmetric approach to a more balanced approach. It calls on investment tribunals to take a dual-track approach that investigates both corruption and investors’ claims, and ensures that each party assumes responsibility for its own misconduct. It also proposes that treaty drafters include anti-corruption provisions that impose strong obligations of anti-corruption on both sides of corruption (i.e., investors and host States) rather than merely on a single party to it

The reform of the Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) mechanism has provoked much debate among legal scholars and practitioners. The critiques of ISDS mainly arise from concerns regarding the legitimacy of the mechanism such as the perceived tolerance for the lack of impartiality and consistency. To allay these concerns, there have been proposals to reform ISDS by establishing investment courts with tenured judges and appellate tribunals. However, international adjudication systems like ISDS cannot be fully analogized to domestic courts in common law countries: ISDS falls into a broader international regime where there are neither hierarchical/centralized decision-making and enforcement authorities nor a multilateral investment treaty, and the rules and principles on foreign investment protection are fragmented in around three thousand Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs). Against this backdrop, this thesis argues that, although there is a general agreement among the international community to further legalize international investment law, the process of legalization via the specific avenue of reforming the adjudication mechanism (i.e. ISDS) is subject to (1) the institutional constraint of international investment law, especially the lack of shared understanding among the international community regarding the treatment of foreign investments, and (2) the internal constraints of adjudication as a mode of social ordering. It further cautions that pursuing predictability while disregarding the low level of shared understandings regarding investment protection may cause more legitimacy problems than it solves

L’investissement national et étranger, privé et public, représente indubitablement l’un des axes les plus importants dans les politiques économiques des États développés et ceux en voie de développement. Le régime juridique de l’investissement étranger en Algérie n’a cessé d’être au centre des débats. D’essence économique, c’est pourquoi le législateur algérien a légiféré en masse sur le sujet notamment, à partir des années 1990, à l’occasion de l’adoption de la loi n° 90-10 du 14 avril 1990 relative à la monnaie et au crédit. Cette dernière était en effet le début d’un long processus de transition et d’orientation économique vers l’économie de marché. Actuellement le régime juridique de l’investissement étranger en Algérie est régi principalement par la loi 16-09 relative à la promotion de l’investissement, accompagné d’un ensemble de décrets d’application. Cette récente réforme du droit des investissements est une avancée importante dans la gestion, l’accueil et le traitement des investissements étrangers en Algérie, et ce au regard de tous les avantages qui sont consentis au profit des investisseurs, ainsi que l’assouplissement des procédures d’installations d’entreprises étrangères sur le territoire national.

Sovereign rights in Exclusive economic zones and Continental shelves are functionally limited to the economic exploitation of these zones. Moreover, in the case of disputed maritime zones these sovereign rights are neither exclusive nor necessarily constant. Nevertheless, states are still expected to provide the investments established in these zones the same treatment they should provide in their territories where they exercise full and constant sovereignty. If a host state agrees to the establishment of an investment in a maritime zone that become later contested, do the occurrence of the contestation and the hazards arising from such contestation relief the host state from its contractual and treaty obligations toward the investment by virtue of the force majeure concept. This paper argues that a traditional interpretation of the force majeure concept in respect of investment agreements and contracts, hampers states ability to de-escalate their maritime disputes, diminishes its capacity to conclude delimitation agreements and reduces the promotion of the UNCLOS III as well as its mechanisms for disputes settlement. It proposes a contextualist interpretation of the force majeure concept that is adapted to the exploitation of disputed maritime zones and states obligations under the international law of the sea. First, it examines the concept of force majeure as a doc-trinal hypothesis and its applications in international contracts and international in-vestment agreements. Second, it analyzes the legal act of maritime contestation as a force majeure event according to the possible interpretations of the concept of “force majeure”. Finally, it examines the recurrent legal implications susceptible of arising out of a contestation; provisional orders and unfavorable delimitation and their qualifica-tion as a force majeure event in the realm of investment agreements and contract.

L’objectif de cet article est d’analyser l’apport des compétences spécifiques des membres du conseil d’administration (CA) au développement des investissements immatériels dans un contexte de marché boursier embryonnaire. Pour conduire cette étude, nous avons utilisé la méthode hypothético-déductive. Ainsi, à partir de la revue de la littérature, nous avons pu formuler trois (03) hypothèses qui ont été testées par la suite. Les données de l’étude ont été collectées auprès d’un échantillon de 78 Sociétés Anonymes opérant au Cameroun. Les résultats obtenus mettent en exergue deux (02) dimensions des compétences des administrateurs qui permettent particulièrement de garantir une information comptable et financière de qualité sur la composante immatérielle et d’améliorer le niveau des investissements immatériels dans ces entreprises.

Este trabalho parte da seguinte indagação: qual seria o melhor critério de avaliação para calcular o reembolso para fins de recesso do acionista minoritário dissidente de uma sociedade por ações? A análise partiu da constatação de que a atual Lei das Sociedades por Ações (Lei nº 6.404 de 1976), conforme entendimento majoritário, fixa como método de cálculo o patrimônio líquido contábil, quando o estatuto social não determina que outro seja aplicado. Contudo o método nem sempre reflete o valor justo da companhia, o que faz com que ao acionista seja ofertado um valor irrisório. Para estudar esse tema, começou-se por analisar a origem e os propósitos para os quais o recesso foi criado. Em seguida, analisaram-se os métodos de cálculo disponíveis para avaliar uma companhia. Estudou-se, também, a maneira como o reembolso é calculado nos Estados Unidos da América e na Itália. Com esse arcabouço teórico, analisou-se o direito brasileiro e, ao final, delineou-se como seria o valor de reembolso ideal. Concluímos pela necessidade de uma reforma legislativa de forma a prever que o valor do recesso deve dar-se obrigatoriamente pelo valor justo e, assim, oferecer proteção ao acionista minoritário e fomentar o mercado de capitais.

There is substantial scholarship on the limitations that international investment agreements (IIAs) place on States’ authority to regulate in the public interest. An area of fundamental importance that has not received scholarly attention in connection with IIAs is public procurement regulation. Given that public procurement is about the needs of States and their citizens, States would want to retain their authority within municipal public procurement laws to decide with whom to contract to meet those needs, and to pursue socioeconomic and industrial policies through procurement. However, most States are parties to IIAs, which impose obligations on them with respect to the protection of foreign investment. This article explores this seminal issue of whether IIAs stand to limit the authority of States in the implementation of procurement legislation and policies. Based on textual analysis and arbitral case study, it argues that treaty-based standards of investment protection can limit States’ authority on the implementation of methods of procurement (such as national competitive tendering or restricted tendering) and socioeconomic policies in procurement. A question that needs fuller engagement is the extent of conflict between specific IIAs and public procurement laws and policies, either regionally or globally, and how to reconcile conflicting obligations to promote foreign investment and sustainable development. This article provides the foundation for such future research.

Since the crises of 1970 and 1980, there has been a remarkable growth in the creation of enterprises in both formal and informal economies. This study attempts to highlight the determinants of the probability of entering the formal sector through an econometric analysis. The data used are based on surveys of 210 SMEs in the in[formal] sector in the city of Bukavu in DR Congo. We find that the probability of entering the formal sector is explained by the entrepreneur’s characteristics (gender and occupied status of employee) and the firm’s characteristics (capital, turnover, and the size of the workforce]. The capital of the company remains the most important constraint that entrepreneurs face to undertake in the formal sector.