by Waswa Balunywa Director Makerere University Business School Kampala, Uganda As the world turns global, many countries are emerging out of the abject poverty into wealth. South Korea and Singapore are classical examples. In the 1960's, South Korea's per capital GDP was similar to that of Uganda. South Korea is now among the developed countries. Uganda is still characterised by massive poverty. The only way to transform Uganda and many African countries is to fuel growth through business development. Given the global competition, Africa may not be able to position herself competitively as a world class competition but must foster the growth of businesses through micro and small enterprises. Many donor funding agencies have identified this and have focused their attention to this sector.
In the developing countries, the constraints of small enterprises have been probably over researched. We propose that the way ahead is to support entrepreneurial development programmes amongst the small business. This should complement the other efforts already in place. Existing efforts has been to promote business start ups, provide markets, provide market information, assist in book-keeping and training in managerial skills. The results so far have not been satisfactory. Gordon (1991) argues that economic policy reforms in Africa cannot be successful without strengthening entrepreneurship. Elkan (1988) argued that entrepreneurship was likely to be much more important in small businesses that in larger ones. There is definitely a need to promote entrepreneurship for small businesses to succeed.
Another area that needs attention is culture and its impact on business. Does the African society interpret business in a similar way as the Asian one and Western one does? Do the cultural dimensions as proposed by Hofstede have any messages for the African business and growth ?
Do they offer explanations? There is a lot of debate among African business owners about the abilities of the Asian business person. May be we need an academic debate now that will translate into research activity.
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Makerere University Business School
(Visit Makerere University's Website)
The Makerere University Business School
(MUBS) is at the centre stage of Business
and Management Education in Uganda. It is
the leading institution in providing
business and management education at the
certificate, diploma, Undergraduate and
Postgraduate levels and a benchmark for
other institutions both nationally and
regionally.
It also facilitates professional
development, promotes entrepreneurship and
is a leading business Management research
institution in Uganda.
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