The Insufficiency of Entrepreneurship Education to Businesses that Exist in Rural Areas in South Africa

Abstract

The studies have shown that the existence of enterprises play a positive role in reducing unemployment and providing people with access to income to improve their standard of living. The challenge lies in the assumption that most enterprises that exist in rural areas do not grow as fast as compared to those in urban areas. Most entrepreneurs establish an enterprise due to unemployment, poverty, low income from their current jobs. Some enterprises tend to be successful, while others remain stagnant and others collapse within a short period of time due to their lack of sustainability. Entrepreneurship education plays a positive role in terms of enhancing entrepreneurs' innovative and creative abilities towards identifying problems and developing plans to solve them through businesses. There is a high rate of rural-urban migration due to pull factors such as employment opportunities whereby people are looking for either permanent or part-time employment within major existing businesses. This indicates that enterprises in rural areas need assistance for improvement and limit the shift of migration of labour to the urban areas. The main aim of this paper is to investigate the insufficiency of entrepreneurship education in businesses that exist in rural areas. The secondary data will be of paramount importance in sourcing information through academic books, articles, government documents from national, provincial and local level. The government has established small- enterprise agencies that promote entrepreneurship education, but do they consider all enterprises including the ones located in the rural areas? The assumption is that enterprises in rural areas also have the potential to rise and create employment for the local people and reduce household poverty. Furthermore, businesses require entrepreneurship education on a continual basis in empowering them with knowledge and skills that will be crucial for their daily operation.