BGI Final Report - Economic Growth - usaid

BGI’s Indonesia ICT assessment also looked specifically at the ways ITC can be used toenhance agricultural productivity. Three key recommendations emerged from BGI’s work:• Leverage ICT to train more farmers using ICT channels, such as videos and radio.• Use mobile money or banking approaches to make it easier and safer for farm productbuyers, e.g., cocoa, to pay farmers.• Provide ICT workshops at project start-up so that USAID, project implementers and newteams benefit directly from results of ICT assessments and understand technical andbusiness models and best practices to design and implement sustainable and scalableICT services. The ICT workshop would provide options for selecting vendors andpartners and raise awareness of alternative approaches to measure rigorously theimpact of ICT on smallholder productivity and income.While each project described above was a discrete activity, they represented a clear evolution inUSAID’s thinking about ICT - from common wisdom of treating ICT as sector with exportpotential to a better understanding of ICT’s critical role in development as contributing tosectors’ success rather than the need to be “ICT-competitive” in world markets. It is imperativethat Missions and implementers consider the way that specific applications in a particular sectormay be useful to the strategies of that sector; as well as the ways that the local ICT industry canbe assisted to in responding to the needs of enterprises. This thinking played a critical role inaltering USAID’s approach to ICT in its solicitations during BGI’s implementation.A.2. Entrepreneurship and InnovationEntrepreneurship and innovation emerged as new themes in enterprise development during thelife of the project. Building on the exiting knowledge base on the role of entrepreneurship andinnovation, BGI conducted a series of activities that culminated in the creation of a handbook forU.S. government staff and personnel working on entrepreneurship programs. BGI researchedand analyzed various economic indicators; collected experiences from experts and successfulentrepreneurs; conducted the feasibility study for an innovation promotion center; and collectedand drafted guidelines for collaboration with the Global Entrepreneurship Initiative.BGI’s first analyzed the role of entrepreneurship and innovation in enterprise developmentthrough various economic indicators and their relationship to promoting entrepreneurship. Theproject’s analysis of the World Bank’s Doing Business index, World Economic Forum’s GlobalCompetitiveness Report, Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom and the GlobalEntrepreneurship Consortium’s Global Entrepreneurship Monitor highlighted academic, socialand policy attributes with the potential to affect the role of high-growth entrepreneurs. The BGIreport, Alternative Business Enabling Environment Indicators: A Review, was followed by aforum in Washington, DC hosted at the Heritage Foundation in 2008 featuring panelists fromvarious organization and index generators.In 2008 and 2009, BGI participated in the Global Entrepreneurship Week which brought forthinternational perspectives on entrepreneurship and innovation and contributed to the globaldialogue on these topics. BGI sponsored an expert panel on Practical Examples ofEntrepreneurship Development Worldwide (2008). The panelists highlighted the importance ofcollaboration with universities and educational institutions as a means to improve businesseducation and create stronger linkages among scientists, engineers and business; the role ofyouth organizations such as INJAZ – a Jordanian organization whose mission to create acommunity of entrepreneurs and qualified employees; and a supportive business enabling8