Journal of Developmental Entrepreneurship

The primary goal of this study is to explore the factors that influence the growth intentions of rural female entrepreneurs (RFEI), focusing on the roles of social capital (SC), psychological capital (PC) and human capital (HC). Additionally, this study investigates whether PC and HC act as mediating mechanisms linking SC to RFEI. Data were collected from 394 female entrepreneurs and analyzed using the PLS algorithm. The results indicate that HC and PC have a positive effect on RFEI and that both HC and PC mediate the linkage between SC and RFEI. This study uniquely integrates SC, PC and HC to explore the direct and mediating effects on RFEI, addressing a critical gap by examining how HC and PC mediate the linkage between SC and RFEI, offering a novel perspective on analyzing entrepreneurial growth intentions. These findings provide valuable insights into fostering entrepreneurship among rural women.

Indigenous entrepreneurship (IE) is generally considered to emerge within culturally and geographically monolithic communities, with academic literature presupposing those communities are stationary. This paper is among the first to investigate the role of migration and mobility in IE, developing an instrumental case study of Swalrawdru, a pseudonymous Rukai mountain community in Taiwan. Eight research participants were identified who migrated from the mountains to the cities of the plains when they were young and later returned to the mountains to establish a business. Through the use of a short survey and semi-structured interviews, we analyze the experiences of these Rukai entrepreneurs to consider the ways in which this mountain-plain mobility affects entrepreneurial aspirations and outcomes. In doing so, first, we challenge the dominant monolithic model in IE research. Second, we contribute to the migrant entrepreneurship (ME) literature. The Rukai entrepreneurs are embedded in mountain and plain settings, mirroring the focus within the prominent “mixed embeddedness” perspective on ethnic and non-ethnic networks and resources. However, we go beyond this focus on structural embeddedness to suggest that indigenous entrepreneurs’ aspirations and choices are inspired not by their mixed embeddedness per se, but rather by the place-belonging generated in the process of migration.

This study analyzes the effect of macroeconomic, social and institutional factors on provincial entrepreneurship, defined as the aggregate number of newly created enterprises per year in a province within a country. Using a robust fixed-effects regression model with data from 63 provinces in Vietnam between 2014 and 2021, the findings reveal that the GDP growth, trained labor force, reduced time costs for regulatory compliance, lower informal charges and enhanced business support services positively influence provincial entrepreneurship. Conversely, economic openness and poverty rates negatively affect entrepreneurship in the provinces. Therefore, we can confirm the effect of some key macro factors on provincial entrepreneurship, implying that the aggregate entrepreneurship rate varies among provinces in a developing country because of differences in their macro factors. Our study contributes to the literature on provincial entrepreneurship and its macro determinants, providing practical implications for policymakers aiming to foster entrepreneurial activities across their provinces in contexts like Vietnam.

The entrepreneurial university, beyond its traditional missions of teaching and research, aims to stimulate innovation and economic development within its region. Despite its growing recognition, existing literature predominantly associates it with academic entrepreneurship and technology transfer. This conceptual paper advocates for an expansion of this concept, especially in the context of developing countries. Through an argumentative review, we highlight the unique needs of these countries, calling for broader integration and linking of student and community entrepreneurs, including those driven by necessity or from disadvantaged backgrounds, as key targets of the entrepreneurial university. This approach adopts a more inclusive view of innovation and reinforces the university’s role in knowledge transfer through entrepreneurship education and support. We introduce the ‘Entrepreneurial University Wheel’ as a novel conceptual framework that redefines the university entrepreneurial ecosystem (UEE), presenting an evolved and alternative approach to the traditional triple helix collaboration (THC) model. This framework aims to enhance resource mobilization for entrepreneurs by leveraging synergies within the university and its broader environment. Our paper aims to reshape how entrepreneurial universities are viewed and implemented in developing countries, unlocking their full potential for economic and social effect. We conclude by proposing a research agenda to explore this promising direction further.

It is increasingly recognized by academia and policy makers that businesses and workers in the informal economy play a key role in enhancing food systems’ performance by reducing poverty and generating employment, as well as by contributing to food and nutrition security and reinforcing the resilience of low-income households. However, studies into the informal economy have paid little attention to the underlying drivers behind the behaviors and dynamics of economic actors in the sector or their responses to changing socio-economic conditions and external enablers that all affect how food systems function. This article presents an overview of insights from informal economy studies and outlines linkages between the internal structure of the informal agri-food sector, its external functional relationships and the behavioral responses by economic actors. We highlight how informal economy actors contribute to food system outcomes and present an analytical framework to understand their motivations and strategies, showing how they respond to incentives that motivate them to enhance their contributions to improved food system outcomes. The novel framework enables a better understanding of the drivers of change in informal parts of the food system, thus creating new opportunities for policy makers and other actors to influence food system outcomes.

Inspired by an aging agripreneur population and the economic importance of fishing and cocoa production, this study examined the mechanisms and challenges of succession planning by selected cocoa farmers and fishers in Ghana. The research approach was quantitative, and the design involved a descriptive cross-sectional survey involving a convenience sample of 141 cocoa farmers and fishers. Upon fulfilment of normality test requirements, analysis of means confirmed an aging agripreneur population. The predominant succession planning mechanism was relay succession. Fishers acknowledged pair trawling, closed season policy and depletion of fish stock to constitute the three leading challenges of succession planning. Cocoa farmers identified limited availability of committed successors, cost of training a successor and time constraint as the top three succession planning challenges. Per principal component analysis, the leading cluster of the fishers’ succession planning challenges constitutes direct factors. That of the cocoa farmers is an interplay between direct and indirect factors. Persistence of these challenges would heighten the tendency of the enterprises to ‘die’ upon the demise of the agripreneurs and threaten the sustainability of the two industries. Sustenance of the industries would require extensive long-term public policy on making the sectors attractive to the youth, for instance through mechanization support and tax incentives.

The environmental policy and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) are two notions of high importance for enterprises and nations. Numerous pages have been written about the environmental policy of companies in their CSR reports. Whether it concerns to raise environmental awareness among their employees or local communities or to give in detail their environmental footprint at the end of the story it is about giving proofs of their environmental policy. Climate change is among the topics of CSR reports and is under examination in this paper. A case study analysis will be applied in order to present how climate change is interpreted in the CSR reports of Greek companies from the petroleum refining industry.