Can Entrepreneurship Improve Africa’s Wellbeing Development?
Introduction
Africa is one of the poorest areas in the world. Data shows that in some countries, poverty reaches unbelievable rates and people live with less than $1 a day (Ngwane 2003). In contrast, in some countries like USA bankers and CEOs earn up to 400 million dollars a year in bonuses and salaries (Enron 2005). On the other hand, entrepreneurship has significantly increased developed countries’ wellbeing in the last century. In this research paper I am going to examine the possible outcomes with the implication of entrepreneurship in the poorest areas of Africa and try to conclude whether it would be beneficial or not.
Entrepreneurship definition
In the last century,
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Finally, Coulter combines all other definitions and integrates them into the following:
Entrepreneurship is the process whereby an individual or a group of individuals use organized efforts and means to pursue opportunities to create value and grow by fulfilling wants and needs through innovation and uniqueness, no matter what resources are currently controlled (Coulter 2000).
Poverty in Africa
This definition gets directly to the heart of the problem, which lies in Africa – poverty and the lack of innovation. The key words of the definition can be linked directly to the existing issues there – lack of economic growth, great needs without satisfaction and very little innovation. To reach an insight how entrepreneurship can be implemented we have to enter deeper into the problems and examine their nature. …... Families are often supporting themselves primarily through agriculture and barely meet their fundamental needs, which consume their earnings. Not to mention if a medical emergency case comes up (Baxter, DeJaeghere 2014).
Entrepreneurial Activity in Africa First of all studies show that the population in Africa does not engage in entrepreneurial activities. This problem should be discussed in more details. Furthermore, studies show that 63.6% of the population in Africa has engaged in only 4.3% of what it is called “TEA” (Total Entrepreneurial
Definitions of entrepreneurship almost always involve the risk taking within the business world. Businessdictionary.com states “The capacity and willingness to develop, organize and manage a business venture along with any of its risks in order to make a profit.” Why we want individuals to create new companies or even to grow products and ideas within an existing company is beyond the scope of this paper be we are going to assume that over all the outcome of this behavior is good for the organization, community, or country. There is little dispute that the United States was known for this behavior over the last two hundred years and it may be something that we are starting to lose. At least it is a behavior that we want to continue to foster.
Some key factors that plays an important role in different entrepreneurship rates around the world are national per capita income, entrepreneurs’ opportunity costs, and how much cultural and political environment supports entrepreneurs. I believe entrepreneurship will continue to grow worldwide because there’s always going to be that one person who has dreams he or she wants to accomplish.
In spite of an unpredictable economy, African entrepreneur ideas are responsible for many changes that you will see in 2017. Inasmuch as enterprise creates opportunities for others, I won't lie, the path is a lonely and imperfect one. Although this may be true, the rewards are well worth the long nights and maxed out credit cards.
In poor or developing countries people are more entrepreneurial than in developed countries out of necessity. In those countries, people have a constant need to earn a little more than what they earn from their regular employment. However, in the developed countries like the U.S., UK, and other industrialized European countries, entrepreneurs pursue business by choice. This is the reason why most of the largest enterprises come out of these
Entrepreneurship is not an inborn skill; it is a product of environment. It involves a complex of economic and social behavior. To be successful, an entrepreneur has to remain dynamic and responsible to the whole environment. Entrepreneurship can hardly survive under any given circumstances. It can flourish only under right environment. It is a part of total system. The social values, culture, government policies, political system, technology, economic conditions, laws, etc influence the growth of entrepreneurship.
Entrepreneurs are also defined as people who are aware of all their strengths and weaknesses. If they are in need or lacking any necessary expertise they are capable of seeking rescue from experts. Actually entrepreneurs do not need to be dependent on other people and always seek for help, thus they have to learn as much as they can all possible aspects of their proposed enterprise, that may include learning precise all of the business world so as to be able to communicate with their bank managers, clients and other experts where necessary.
The existing literature on entrepreneurship stems from economical conceptual frameworks developed in the early twentieth century by Schumpeter, Cole, Kirzner among others. Fayolle (2014) notes that entrepreneurship has gained considerable study
The role of entrepreneurship in the economy of a country is to inspire new business ventures that support wealth
Entrepreneurship involves entrepreneurial skills to develop, organize and manage a business venture by focussing on opportunities along with any of its risks in order to make a profit. Entrepreneurship is also an approach to management that can be applied in start-up situations as well as within established businesses. (Business Management: a contemporary compilation)
This is not the case always, for example the culture plays an important role in this entrepreneurial process. Turkey has a stable economic and political conditions, variety of industries are performing well in the domestic market, the customers are early adopters which are all good signs for entrepreneurship, but only 6% of the population of entrepreneurs because they have limited capital, large ponderous bureaucracy with many regulations though the regulations fail to protect the intellectual property. Let us consider Uganda on the other hand, contrary to the stable government of Turkey, Uganda has a violent past, but they have the highest entrepreneurship rate of 28%, from hand crafted furniture, trinkets, cobblers, honey makers, everyone is selling something. There may not be a Steve jobs or Bill gates but most people embody the entrepreneurial spirit. High unemployment and survival rate are the key factors driving the entrepreneurial spirit in Uganda, there are also other factors in place. The initiative to lay down fiber optic cables has enabled the country to link even the rural villages to various resources. In this case we can observe two important factors such as necessity (Uganda) and choice (Turkey) at play here which are mainly based on the culture and history
An entrepreneur is “a person who organizes and manages a business with considerable initiative and risk”. In other definitions an entrepreneur “identifies an opportunity or a gap in a market and evaluates the risk related to the establishment of the business and is prepared to take the associated risk to start the business in the quest for making profit; and has the ability to obtain the resources to establish and grow a business”. Entrepreneurship exceedingly relies on entrepreneurs to start-up, develop and produce companies across the use of their
Entrepreneurship is a journey. A lifestyle. Success comes with time, taking action and hustling your butt off.
Entrepreneuring: efforts to bring about new economic, social, institutional, and cultural environments through the actions of an individual or group of individuals → emancipatory process with broad change potential. This view foregrounds three aspects: (1) seeking autonomy, (2) authoring, and (3) making declarations.
Entrepreneurship is defined as the practice of beginning a new trade or reviving an existing business, for capitalizing on fresh opportunities. The statement were analyzing today is all about entrepreneurship. The author here is trying to explain that like every coin has two sides, entrepreneurship also has benefits and drawbacks. Every year the number of people realizing the dream of owning a business is increasing across the world. The level of interest in entrepreneurship among the people is never been higher than in 21st century. At recent study by Ernst and Young shows that 78% of influenced people of America believe that the entrepreneurship will define the trend of the century. There are number of people who leave the security of job in corporate world to live their dream of starting their own business and being independent. Then there are others who are forced to become an entrepreneur as a result of downsizing in the current market and the rest are who themselves decide to become entrepreneur from start. In today’s world money is the only thing that matters. So people blindly jump into the world of entrepreneurship without calculating the risk involved and uncertainty of starting a new business. Although staring and setting up a new business is never easy but with the help and
Definitional issues: entrepreneurship, micro enterprise and rurality Numerous definition of entrepreneurship can also be found in the literature. Hisrich and Peters (1998) define entrepreneurship as “the process of creating something new with value by devoting the necessary time effort assuming the accompanying financial, physic and social risks and receiving the resulting rewards of monetary and personal satisfaction and independence” while Zacharis et al (2000) define entrepreneurship as “ any attempt to create a new business enterprise or to expand existing business by an individual, ateam individuals or an established business”.