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- Entrepreneurship education is broadly considered an important factor in promoting an entrepreneurial culture among higher education students. Considering the importance of entrepreneurship to economic growth, job creation and poverty alleviation, there is a need to train entrepreneurs and to equip them with an entrepreneurial culture that promotes entrepreneurship. However, the South African education system is lacking when it comes to entrepreneurship education. The education system seems to promote the white-collar jobs rather than self-employment and the methodology that is used to teach entrepreneurship studies focuses more on the theory of entrepreneurship than on its practice. Against this background, this study sought to identify the role of education in promoting an entrepreneurship culture among the youth, focusing on the University of Zululand as a case study. The researcher used primary data for this study. The study adopted a mixed methods approach where data was collected using questionnaires and interview schedules from 374 University of Zululand students and 11 heads of departments from the university’s faculties. The results from the study show that there was no consistent promotion of entrepreneurship across the university’s faculties and departments. There was a need to improve the entrepreneurship curriculum, as it was found that it did not equip students with an entrepreneurship culture. Entrepreneurship studies were done in business-related departments and were not readily promoted in non-business departments. A policy implication arose from these findings is that there is a need for the development of entrepreneurship-based curriculum as a way of promoting entrepreneurship. The policymakers were also encouraged to develop incubation centres for grooming entrepreneurs at higher learning institutions.
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- Information asymmetry is regarded as factors that affect SMMEs and issues hindering SMMEs growth which include management skills, market access and lack of training. This is supported by Rogerson (2008) that several challenges facing SMMEs development in South Africa have been unapproachable. Number of factors have been identified which relate to markets access and marketing, business management skills, training, finance and inadequate institutional support. The SMME sector is regarded as a potential employment creator and contributes significantly to the economic growth of South Africa. SMMEs have the major share of the development and almost half of the total employment in the economy. While argument still exists about the comparative contribution of SMMEs to the economy, this sector contributes a massive share of employment which contributes significantly in the economy. However, SMMEs are facing challenges that prevent them from growing, and causing a large percentage of SMMEs to shut down in their first two years of operation. This study aims to discover the information asymmetry and obstacles on SMMEs growth in uThungulu district municipality. An investigation was conducted among owners in all local SMMEs in the district to identify obstacles perceived as central to SMMEs growth. Structured questionnaires were used to collect data. The research findings indicate that lack of training and management skills are one of the challenges faced by SMMEs since the majority of entrepreneurs have only matric qualifications. The use of technology was also identified as an obstacle on SMMEs growth.
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