empirica, together with the University of Kassel, successfully completed a study about entrepreneurship in developing countries. The study was carried out on behalf of the German Academic Exchange Service (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst, DAAD). The final report describes and analyses nine projects in DAAD programmes related to university-business co-operation in target countries in Africa and Asia. The countries covered include Botswana, South Africa, Namibia, Ghana, Kenya, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Tanzania, Egypt, Ethiopia, Azerbaijan and Vietnam. In all nine projects, universities in the target countries develop entrepreneurship education programmes, supported by German universities as well as businesses and business associations on both sides. Recommendations for action include the following: (1) Interlinking projects more intensively: among themselves and beyond; (2) Strengthening investment in start-ups; (3) Pooling entrepreneurship education competencies of all stakeholders; (4) Strengthening financing of projects; (5) Organisationally supporting projects. “The projects pursue different approaches to building and expanding entrepreneurship education in the target countries”, explains empirica’s study manager Stefan Lilischkis. “Most commonly, they do what we named ‘proactive adaption’, that is they adapt approaches that are successful in Germany to the specific conditions in the target countries.”

The final report in German language is available at empirica’s website under “Research & Innovation Publications” as well as at the DAAD’s website (https://www.daad.de/medien/downloads/p32_entrepreneurship-studie_zum_programm_praxispartnerschaften.pdf).

A short English version is also available here (for DAAD see https://www.daad.de/medien/downloads/entrepreneurship_study.pdf).