Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: African traditional entrepreneurship schemes have gained growing scholarly attention in recent times, with the Indigenous Igbo Entrepreneurship Scheme (IIES) recognized as the most impactful. Although scholars have explored various dimensions of the IIES, they agree that the phenomenon requires more exploration in order to position it properly in the global literature of entrepreneurship and support its adoption in other regions beyond the Igbo context. Currently, very few studies have investigated the roles, impediments, and possible solutions to the challenges faced by the IIES, and none is known that covers these three areas simultaneously. By deploying a mixed research method involving in-depth interviews with IIES enrollees and trainers, and a systematic literature review, this study proposes the 3Rs framework to the IIES. Thus, it anchors on the entrepreneurial venture creation theory and the multidimensional construct to explore the IIES’s relevance, restraints, and remedies. Several findings relating to the relevance of the scheme, such as its economic, social, financial, and environmental contributions, the restraints (informality, lack of regulation, eroding trust, and dwindling enrolment), and the remedies (including the formulation of regulatory policies, formalization of the scheme, talent hunting, and rekindling the spiritual side) are highlighted. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
Source: Businesses
Authors: Godswill Agu, Clara Margaça
Language: English
Subfield: Management of Technology and Innovation
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $1,207
OpenAlex ID: W4407640151