IMPACT OF ENTREPRENEURIAL DEVELOPMENT ON JOB CREATION IN NIGERIA

Entrepreneurship development is critical to job creation in Nigeria, as it enhances entrepreneurial ecosystem, skills, as well as capacities required for sustainable business ventures and growth. It involves the creation of an enabling environment for start-ups, innovation and job creation. Against this backdrop, this paper investigates the impact of entrepreneurial development on job creation in Nigeria. It utilizes annual time series data over the period 1990-2023 and the Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) multiple regression estimation approach. Job creation is taken as the dependent variable, while risk –taking, initiative and business experience are taken as the independent variables, capturing entrepreneurial development. The results demonstrate that entrepreneurial development is critical to the creation of jobs in Nigeria. Specifically, risk-taking is positively and moderately related to job creation. Initiative has a positive and significant impact on job creation, while business experience, through positive is not significant on job creation. Based on the findings, it is suggested that increased measures, strategies and policy responses to steer entrepreneurship development put in place to particularly start-ups and SMEs, in order to enhance the creation of jobs in Nigeria.