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Entrepreneurial orientation has recently been touted as a tool for solving enterprise failures in emerged and emerging economies especially during and after an epidemic. This study aims at understanding the impact of entrepreneurial orientation on enterprise performance in the Ghanaian food processing industry by assessing the mediating effects of innovation types and intellectual property. Data were collected from 702 owners/managers in the food processing industry via survey questionnaires. The data were analyzed using the partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to test the hypothesis via the Smart PLS software. The findings show that entrepreneurial orientation, innovation types, and intellectual property positively and significantly influenced enterprise performance. Furthermore, the results indicated that the mediation effects of innovation types and intellectual property were full and partial, respectively. Useful policy implications are further proposed and discussed based on the study results.

This study assessed the maintenance practices and quality improvements of public infrastructure by adopting the National Theatre of Ghana as a case study. This research specifically examined maintenance practices of the National Theatre, a national asset and the biggest auditorium used by the country to host major national events. A single case study design was employed for the study. Both questionnaires and interviews were used to obtain data from sampled staff and management of the National Theatre. The study revealed that the maintenance practices at the theatre are mostly routine involving cleaning, fumigation and servicing. There are also quarterly and annual maintenance schedules, but all these are predictive and preventive maintenance works. The maintenance works at the theatre have also ensured that the National Theatre is serene and habitable in the short term. The maintenance practices also help to maintain the aesthetics and attraction of the theatre in the medium term, and in the long term, maintenance practices can forestall the sudden breakdown of major equipment hence prevented the sudden collapse of the entire facility. However, the study found a gap between maintenance practices and quality maintenance practices at the National Theatre. The theatre has not integrated quality management practices, hence some of the important long-term benefits of maintenance practices have been missed and there is a backlog of maintenance that need to be worked out. Staff of the National theatre are not oblivious to the backlog of maintenance that the facility faced with but suggested that this is a result of inadequate budgetary allocation for maintenance. The study concludes that increasing budgetary appropriation for maintenance, there is a need to improve public cooperation and support for the National Theatre in order to improve the quality of the edifice.

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to analyze the performance of indigenous innovation in developing countries in the era of trade liberalization. It analyzes indigenous innovation from research and development (R&D) investments to innovation output and its effect on economic growth.Design/methodology/approachThe sample for this study includes 20 middle-income countries across five continents for the period between 1994 and 2018. The study employs the Crepon Duguet and Mairessec CDM model in a panel data setting to do a multistage analysis of the innovation process. A vector error correction model VECM is employed to test for Granger causality between the variables investigated.FindingsThe results show that imports and foreign direct investments (FDI) have generally have short-run and long-run causal effects on domestic R&D investments. In regions where imports and FDI do not have individual causal effects on innovation output, a joint increase in each of them and R&D have both short-run and long-run causal effects. Indigenous innovation is a significant contributor to economic growth when a country can produce and export novel products.Research limitations/implicationsThe sample is only limited to developing economies, and due to the unavailability of data, only 20 countries were captured.Practical implicationsImported products and FDI are critical to the innovation drive when such activities are targeted at enhancing indigenous innovation from R&D to the production of new products. Hence, policy formulation should encourage the absorption of foreign technologies that serve as inputs to indigenous innovation.Originality/valueThis paper focuses specifically on indigenous innovation and analyses the influence of foreign technologies in this effort. It tests the moderating roles of imports and FDI in the relationship between R&D and innovation output, concluding that both variables enhance the effect of R&D on innovation output.

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