Africa will have the most prominent young workforce in the world by 2040 and will be unable to meet its growing employment demands. For young students constrained by insufficient and traditional education offered, the survival and growth of youth-led enterprises remains a constant challenge
The Kenyan government's Vision 2030 singles out competitive education, research, and innovation as the vehicle that will drive Kenya into becoming a middle-income economy. However, enterprise-focused policies and interventions are developed for the youth rather than with the youth. Kenyan universities are not part of the holistic youth entrepreneurship ecosystem and often create their own silos.
This project seeks to bridge this lacuna by creating a partnership between Kenya's Youth Enterprise Development Fund (YEDF), KCA University, and Nottingham University. The partners aim to promote entrepreneurship education that gives voice and agency to young people to co-create their opportunities to develop enterprises and innovate for sustainability.
The project will research, develop and design creative teaching resources and pedagogies that integrate creativity processes within youth entrepreneurial training. In addition, they will seek to open broader conversations and think about how universities and practitioners of entrepreneurship can unlock existing silos and collaborate to create a youth-friendly entrepreneurship ecosystem.
There is a need to support and develop opportunity-driven entrepreneurship through fostering innovation, creativity and discovery that enables the youth to tackle the sustainable development challenges we face today.
The use of inclusive, participatory methodologies gives voice and agency to the young people to co-create their own lived experiences and opportunities to develop enterprises and innovate for sustainability.