By Ornetta Waldron
Natalie is a micro-enterprise owner and a single parent of three school-age children. She had been able to secure a loan to purchase equipment for a catering business that she operated in a kitchen adjacent to her home. Mike had borrowed money from a friend to give him a start with his dog food ‘hustle.’ Joan had sold confectionary outside a primary school for close to eight years. What do they all have in common? They are among the many small business owners facing the consequences of COVID-19, wedged between the proverbial ‘rock and a hard place,’ afflicted by a mindset of hopelessness.
