Entrepreneurship Development in the Last Decade: A Systematic Review

Abstract

As the world struggles with the effects of the coronavirus pandemic, coupled with the worsening situation of poverty and unemployment, the importance of entrepreneurship development has been brought to the forefront. Entrepreneurship Development, as the term implies, is the funding, infrastructure provision, creation of skills and training acquisition centres, making the training personnel available etc. for entrepreneurship to thrive. Using the systematic quantitative Assessment Technique (SQAT), this study carried out a systematic review of 148 Entrepreneurship Development journal articles in the last decade I,e, 2012 – 2021 to provide insight as to the working of entrepreneurship development on employment generation. Besides these primary objectives, this review also sought to understand the time distribution, geographic distribution. Types and data collection methods of these ED articles. A review of the empirical evidence revealed that entrepreneurship development is important for employment generation. The review also revealed that over the last Decade, 2012 – 2021 interest on ED has grown from year to year, with most of the research in Africa, Asia, and Portugal. Furthermore, most ED research has been empirical in nature, with surveys being the most used means of data collection. There has been an inadequacy of qualitative studies in ED scholarship and this represents a significant gap which future researchers should endeavour to address.