Role of Incubation Centers in Promoting Sustainable Development in Nigeria

Abstract

Incubation centers play a vital role in the sustainable development of an economy. To promote the entrepreneurial ecosystem and innovation in Nigeria, the government has taken initiatives by establishing incubation centers. The present study explores the role played by incubation centers' in Nigeria and the problems and challenges perceived by incubation centers and incubatees. The purpose of the present study is also to explore suitable strategies which can bring in sustainable development and helps to ensure entrepreneurs a promising future in the state of Kano. Only a few existing studies have worked on the perspective of incubation centers and incubatees. The present study prepares a questionnaire using a Likert scale to collect the responses using a convenience sampling technique. Henry Garrett Ranking Technique is used to find the most alarming challenges and the incubates' expectations from incubation centers' services. The rank-order outcomes of the study have clearly shown that developing a business plan, supporting product design and prototype, access to finances, and providing workforce and skill-based training to incubatees are the priority support services. An incubation center expects to provide these services to its incubatees. Incubatees are not satisfied with incubation centers’ services like conducting workshops/trade fairs, product development activities/laboratory arrangements, taking periodic feedback about incubator services, and the skills of trained staff of the incubation centers. The incubatees perceived that the incubation center in Kano is highly dependent on the quality of the manager for the services provided to incubates. For the effective outcome of incubation centers, training and mentoring should be assessed periodically by an external evaluator using an outcome-based approach. All such efforts will result in the real growth of incubation centers and their role in promoting innovation and entrepreneurship.

Received: 4 November 2022 / Accepted: 26 December 2022 / Published: 5 January 2023