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This study aims to analyze the nature of challenges facing five low-tech Palestinian small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) clusters and to understand their dynamics. The study proposes a number of key policies necessary to foster start-ups and the growth of the current clusters.

Five low-tech Palestinian clusters were selected for investigation. Using multiple sources of evidence, the research questions are answered using a case study approach. Twelve semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with representatives from the government, private sector and universities. Content analysis was used to analyze the data obtained from the interviews.

These five low-tech clusters in Palestine are located in a complex environment that imposes a mix of challenges which adversely affect their performance. The challenges facing Palestinian clusters are different in terms of their degree of complexity. The common challenges facing the Palestinian low-tech SME clusters are the fundamental lack of innovative stimulation policies or of incentives in the Palestinian ecosystem, lack of trust, unfair competition, limited access to finance, lack of access to promising markets and the limited collaboration between different parties. More focused policies are suggested to the Palestinian authorities.

Clusters represent a new and complementary way of understanding an economy, organizing economic development, enhancing competitiveness and innovation through sectoral specialization and cooperation and implementing public policies. In the overwhelming majority of Palestinian entities categorized as SMEs, clustering adds value to the firms from the point of view of productivity and by battling unemployment, which is rampant among Palestinian youth.

Even though the issue of clusters in SMEs has been well researched in developed countries, empirical studies are still lacking in this developing region. The attention given to policies in this article allows using the insights gained for cluster development in Palestine.

Higher productivity in the potato value chain in Rwanda requires good quality seed potatoes. The article analyzes how innovations were introduced in the framework of a development project resulting in a partnership between a firm and two educational institutions to produce better seed potatoes, using the Triple Helix approach.

In the Triple Helix model government, academia and the private sector work together to develop and introduce innovations. This led to producing and introducing improved seed potatoes at an affordable price through a public private partnership (PPP). Interviews with experts and a survey of local producers were carried out to identify factors influencing the success of the partnership.

A Service, Training and Innovation Center (STIC) has been created to produce the first clean potato seeds in Africa on a commercial scale, based on cultivation of in vitro potato plantlets and aeroponics to produce mini-tubers. It is called Seed Potato Advancement Centre, an education–enterprise partnership, using these plantlets to produce mini-tubers through aeroponics. Seed multipliers are responsible for the next three stages of seed multiplication. The final product is the certified potato, sold to ware potato farmers. The availability of disease-free seed potatoes in Rwanda gives a boost to the potato value chains and contributes to food security. The partnership was successful because of the support from the government and donors, with the private sector and the extension services helping to implement the innovations effectively.

The limitation is that the number of experts interviewed is limited and the survey did not only deal with potato-related activities. The focus is on one region only, but the most important potato growing area in Rwanda.

STICs function as a tool for cooperation between government, private sector and the knowledge sector to achieve commercial and development goals. They function as a channel for technology transfer. They allow applied research, including agronomic research; information collection; and dissemination, networking, training, organization of outreach activities. The model can be repeated in other sectors and countries.

The paper looks at a PPP in agriculture with educational institutions. Second, the Triple Helix and value chain literature is used to study the introduction and implementation of appropriate innovations, while factors determining the success of the partnership were identified. This concerns the first production of clean seed potatoes in Africa on a commercial scale.

This study aims to analyze the challenges facing five Palestinian clusters and to understand their dynamics and level of development. Using multiple sources of evidence, the research questions are answered using semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions. Content analysis was used to analyze the data obtained. The five clusters in Palestine are located in a complex environment that imposes a mix of challenges that adversely affect their performance. The challenges facing Palestinian clusters are different in terms of their degree of complexity. The common challenges facing the Palestinian clusters are the fundamental lack of innovative stimulation policies or incentives in the Palestinian ecosystem, lack of trust, unfair competition, limited access to finance, lack of access to promising markets, and the limited collaboration between different parties. More focused policies are suggested to the Palestinian authorities.

This article explores the potential of an emerging group of farmers in Kenya, namely the growing segment of urban-based medium-size farmers, often called “telephone farmers”. To what extent do they benefit from an emerging ecosystem to support them in operating their farms, and what does that mean for the Hidden middle of agricultural value chains, the actors between the farmers and consumers? Unlocking the potential production of telephone farmers will require more services from collectors, traders, transport firms, the storage facilities, wholesalers and processing units and retailers. Ultimately, optimized telephone farm production benefits the business of Hidden middle value chain actors, increases incomes and jobs and improves food security.

Based on a survey and in-depth interviews a profile of the telephone farmers is given and their role as innovators is analyzed. The Latia Resource Centre (LRC) provides assistance to medium-size farmers, like the telephone farmers, helping them to prepare business plans and use modern technology and contributing to an emerging ecosystem providing support to all farmers.

The article analyzes the medium-size telephone farmers. It documents the contributions of this new agricultural actor to developing value chains and a dynamic ecosystem. The paper profiles the telephone farmers first and then identifies what they need and the support they receive. The emerging innovative ecosystem impacts agricultural productivity and production and hence the development of value chains. Small farmers gain access to opportunities offered by telephone farmers, working for them as outgrower or farm worker.

The authors used a small sample of 51 farmers and covered only a two-year period.

Small farmers are being helped through the emerging eco-system and farm labor acquire skills, which they can also you on another or their own farm.

Based on the analysis an even more effective ecosystem is suggested and policy recommendations are formulated before the conclusion is drawn that these medium-size farmers contribute to innovation diffusion, inclusive value chain development and food security and are becoming part of this expanding, innovative ecosystem. Following the debate on food security the results suggest to pay more attention to the development of telephone farmers given their role in developing agricultural value chains and innovative ecosystems.

The purpose of this paper is answer the research question to what extent Ethiopian universities can be considered to be entrepreneurial and explains possible differences among these universities.

The paper is inspired by a mixed methods study at nine universities in Ethiopia applying the entrepreneurial university framework of the European Commission/OECD: a content analysis of university policy and educational documents, a structured survey with 203 respondents, in particular staff and students, and in-depth interviews and focus group discussions with 223 people comprising university top-management, faculty, students and external stakeholders.

Findings indicate that entrepreneurial activities in Ethiopian universities are at their infant stage with limited differences among the universities. The universities are operating in a top-down, central governmental-led development that is not enabling entrepreneurial behaviour at the level of the individual institutions. The paper argues that within this context, leadership is the lever for an entrepreneurial turn at the universities.

Entrepreneurship development is a priority in many African countries as an instrument for employability of the predominant young populations towards which universities are expected to contribute considerably. The study highlights the tension between a strong say of the government in university operations and creating an autonomous, integrated entrepreneurial culture.

The results of this study have relevance for the higher education community in terms of understanding the complexity of transforming institutions into more entrepreneurial organisations in Africa. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, there is no previous study that examines entrepreneurial characteristics of several universities in Ethiopia.

The paper analyzes the adaptive behavior of farmers in the Yunnan province of China, where drought is occurring more frequently. We focus on the experiences with adaptation to climate change by farmers in the rural areas of China.

The research is based on a survey and a number of in-depth interviews of key stakeholders in a drought-stricken region.

Where the government is not always coming forward, the farmers take initiatives to adapt to the new situation of drought. Different mechanisms are being used, some linked to government policies and subsidies, other initiatives are initiated by the farmers themselves, individually or in small groups.

More research on the livelihood strategies is necessary to better understand what these strategies mean for the household income and hence for the survival chances of poor households.

Climate change encourages local actors to play a role in drought adaptation, developing policies for mitigating the consequences of drought, trying to create water markets and involving local companies and water user associations. The research suggests stimulating the initiatives of the farmers and to create an enabling environment for them.

Without government policies we will see growing inequalities in the rural areas of China.

We studied how in the case of drought farmers react to adapt to the new reality. Different adaptation strategies are distinguished and their relation to different government policies is established. We observed that farmers find their own solutions and create their own governance structures to assure for example supply of additional water to their fields.