Overcoming barriers in agri-business development: two education programs for entrepreneurs in the Swedish agricultural sector

Abstract

Purpose: The paper compares two government-sponsored education programs for agricultural entrepreneurs: a Leadership program and a Lean program. Methodology: The paper takes both a qualitative and a quantitative approach in its collection and analysis of data from 54 semistructured interviews and from a survey with 109 participants. Findings: The main challenges to business and personal development are time pressure and the need for better communications. The Leadership program participants emphasize the effect of internal barriers such as fixed mind-sets. The Lean program participants emphasize the effect of external barriers such as financing. Both groups emphasize personal and business growth more than the control group. Practical Implications: Entrepreneur education programs can help participants, program developers, and advisory organizations identify and manage business challenges and barriers. Theoretical Implications: The paper contributes to the literature about educations for entrepreneurs in the agricultural sector with its examination of agricultural entrepreneurs' reflections on barriers and challenges in business development and their linkage to overcoming barriers focused on a resource-based perspective with different types of resources. Originality/Value: The paper encourages examination of development challenges and barriers from the perspective of participators in entrepreneur education programs.

Towards a Global Entrepreneurial Culture: A Systematic Review of the Effectiveness of Entrepreneurship Education Programs

“…The quasi-experimental studies, mixed-method study design, and pre-post study [63,65,67,70,71,78,80,84,85,[87][88][89] revealed consistent statistical results on the interventions' gains. There were global improvements between pre-and post-intervention.…”

“…The Leader Practice program (LP) revealed gains in self-leadership and the role of leader; in addition, students achieved gains in understanding the fact that leaders can delegate tasks and responsibilities and recognized the need for continuous improvement in communication with employees and with their family members; in turn, the Lean Agriculture program (LA) proved to be effective in discovering ways of working smoothly, establishing work routines and following previously established procedures, and managing time in a correct way [88].…”

“…These studies are focused on programs that specifically target the development of ES [62,63,65,66,87], the development of business plans and models [73,74,78,91], and the promotion of skills within the scope of social entrepreneurship and sustainability [64,81,82] in the scope of agriculture [77,88] and of technologies [63,87,90]. Some specific competences also stand out, such as teamwork [63,67,73,81,86,89], self-efficacy [64,70,72,74,78,84], leadership [86,88], self-confidence [64,73,81], proactivity and initiative [64,66,84], innovation [64,66,68,84], problem solving [66,72,86], empathy [64,81], self-esteem [8...…”

“…Most studies had teachers as the only facilitators of the programs (66%) (n = 19), but in addition to teachers, some studies presented the collaboration of local entrepreneurs [76,87], volunteers [80], mentors and coaches [85,88], professional internships supervisors [87], and community specialists such as lawyers and military personnel [70].…”

Ecopreneurial Education and Support: Developing the Innovators of Today and Tomorrow

“…Agri-food is a complex sector, highly driven by business to business (B2B) relationships and commercial associations, making the "valley of death" very wide. The main challenges to translating from ideation to commercialization and business and personal development are lack of entrepreneurial learning time pressures, lack of skilled employees who can come into the business and the need for better communications and less so lack of advice and support and weak alignment between the product/service and the market [105,106]. Farm491 takes an intentionally non-linear approach to supporting entrepreneurs, informed by design thinking principles, where an entrepreneur can plug into each component of the Farm491 incubator offer, allowing for a highly targeted approach to each individual entrepreneur and their needs.…”