Entrepreneurship and Economic Development in Eleme Lga, Rivers State, Nigeria

The paper aims at examining the effect of entrepreneurship on economic development in Eleme LGA in Rivers State, Nigeria. Specifically, it investigates the effect of entrepreneurship on employment generation and welfare in the Eleme Local Government Area of Rivers State. Primary data were collected using the questionnaire and analyzed using simple percentage, arithmetic mean, standard deviation and T-test was used for testing the hypotheses. Key findings of the study revealed that entrepreneurship has a strong, positive, and significant effect on job creation and that it has a negative but insignificant relationship with welfare. The study therefore concluded that entrepreneurship has a positive but weak effect on economic development in Eleme LGA, Rivers State. It is hereby recommended that government should support job creation by offering entrepreneurial programmes such as training, micro loans, and tax incentives, while encouraging mentorship to sustain local businesses in Eleme. Also the local government should integrate welfare and entrepreneurship development by providing social safety nets like health care and financial aids for low-income entrepreneurs to improve both welfare and economic growth and development.