Here is what we found out!
The world’s current population is estimated to be around 8.1 billion. Among this figure is a sizeable entrepreneurship population which is, according to the Cambridge Dictionary defined as: ‘Someone who starts their own business, especially when this involves seeing a new opportunity.’
Whilst there are plenty of posts out there talking about entrepreneurship in individual nations, we wanted to find out more about how widespread and, perhaps, divergent entrepreneurship is worldwide.
Here is what we found out:
1) America: according to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, there are believed to be around 31 million entrepreneurs in America, accounting for around 16% of the total adult workforce. Not only this, but as the largest economy on the planet (GDP of over 25.5 trillion in 2022) entrepreneurs have many possible sources to turn to for venture capital / other funding.
2) South America: whilst there are believed to be many entrepreneurs, the World Bank reported in its ‘Latin American Entrepreneurs Many Firms but Little Innovation’ reported that – compared to other similar economies worldwide – Latin American entrepreneurs were noticeably less innovative in, for example, bringing new products to market as well as investing in R&D / Patent activity.
3) Europe: closely tied to America in terms of number of entrepreneurs, the European Commission reported that – as at 2021 – the EU’s business economy was made up of 31.5 million entrepreneurs. What did that breakdown look like for Member States? First was France (4.8 million), then Italy (4.5 million), followed by Spain (3.4 million) and, lastly, Germany (3.1 million).
4) Africa: According to OECD Research more than a ¼ of all African businesses were founded by women. This takes Africa in the lead worldwide for the highest proportion of women entrepreneurs. Despite this, it is thought that many African female entrepreneurs face significant hurdles to secure investment / finance into their business ideas (for example, gender bias).
5) Asia: according to the Asia Development Bank in 2020 there were believed to be over 71 million MSME’s (micro, small and medium enterprises) in Southeast Asia. Not only this, but there has been a surge in the past 3 years in entrepreneurial activity. For example, in India, total entrepreneurial activity is believed to have grown from 5.3% in 2020 to 14.4% in 2021.
6) Australia: as at June 2023 there were over 2.5 million entrepreneurs in Australia.
With all the above interesting information, it is no wonder that the global amount of entrepreneurs today is estimated to be around 582 million and we certainly hope to see this rise even higher!
To find out more about our entrepreneur start-up mentoring services for entrepreneurs between 16 and 25 years old, please visit: Young E3 Entrepreneurship Fund (yethree.com)