Publication•July 10, 2020
Iraqi Startups' Ecosystem Monitor V1
#ICT Iraq#Human Resources#Capacity Building
July 10, 2020Kapita Research Team
This report evaluates Iraq's entrepreneurial ecosystem using a GEM-adapted questionnaire administered to 20 experts. It identifies high entrepreneurial opportunities and motivations among Iraqi youth but notes significant deficiencies. Key challenges include insufficient research and development, education, government policies/programs, and financial support. Iraq generally scores below the MENA region average in all assessed frameworks, highlighting areas needing urgent development for a thriving private sector. PDF
Publication Overview
July 10, 2020
This report evaluates Iraq's entrepreneurial ecosystem using a GEM-adapted questionnaire administered to 20 experts. It identifies high entrepreneurial opportunities and motivations among Iraqi youth but notes significant deficiencies. Key challenges include insufficient research and development, education, government policies/programs, and financial support. Iraq generally scores below the MENA region average in all assessed frameworks, highlighting areas needing urgent development for a thriving private sector. PDF
Full Content
Executive Summary
Globally, the engine of economic growth is the private sector and its drivers are the entrepreneurs. The fall in global oil prices, over-reliance on imported goods, conflicts, and corruption, all adversely affected the development of the private sector in Iraq.
Globally, the engine of economic growth is the private sector and its drivers are the entrepreneurs. The fall in global oil prices, over-reliance on imported goods, conflicts, and corruption, all adversely affected the development of the private sector in Iraq.
Since 2003, the internet has been made widely available and accessible to Iraqis. As a result many diverse communities emerged, including a great deal of programmers, graphic designers, photographers etc. Not long ago the Iraqi startups’ ecosystem started to form its foundation. This drew the attention of many funding and supporting organizations, local and international agencies and universities.
This study aims to evaluate the ecosystem on various aspects, each called a framework and this is based on experts’ evaluations. A questionnaire-based methodology developed by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) was adopted to gain insights about the fourteen entrepreneurial frameworks.
Survey Frameworks include:
1. Financial support for new and small firms.
2. Government policies to support new and small firms.
3. Government programs to support new and small firms.
4. Education and training, with emphasis on new and small firms.
5. Research and development transfer to new and small firms.
6. Commercial, legal infrastructure relevant to new and small firms.
7. Internal [within the country] market openness.
8. Access to physical infrastructure for new and small firms.
9. Cultural, social norms that encouraged new and small firms.
10. Presence of entrepreneurial opportunities in the country.
11. Availability of skills and capacity to implement new firms in the general population.
12. The presence of motivations to create new firms in the general population.
13. Support for the participation of women in entrepreneurial initiatives.
14. The presence of conditions that would provide protection for intellectual property rights.
Iraq has a high potential for entrepreneurial opportunities and even more so the Iraqi youth is ardent and eager to establish new businesses. However, the lack of some of the most prominent motivating factors like sufficient research and development, adequate education, governmental programs and policies, in addition to limited financial support, have resulted in delays in the development process of the entrepreneurial sphere.
In comparison to some of the MENA countries, Iraq scored below the average of MENA countries across all frameworks. Thus, thorough planning and cooperation between all stakeholders of the entrepreneurial ecosystem is needed to develop the current situation and achieve the goals of private sector development.
The market research discusses in detail the fourteen frameworks in comparison with the MENA region and includes recommendations derived from the findings.
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Publication Details
Author:Kapita Research Team
Published:July 10, 2020
Category:report
Documents:1 PDF
Tags:3
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