Entrepreneurial Efficacy in Agricultural Sector of Pakistan

Abstract

Entrepreneurial efficacy is about acquiring skills pertaining to create an innovation-based entrepreneurial firm in the face of uncertainty. Pakistan has the least number of new entrepreneurial startups even among the factor-driven economies indicating a low level of efficacy among the masses. The objectives of the study were to assess entrepreneurial efficacy across different productive sectors of agricultural business – the largest employment generating sector - in Pakistan. The study adopted instruments from the study of McGee et al. and conducted exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and multi-group CFA to establish its stability. The results of CFA revealed that difference in nature of business has a differentiating effect on entrepreneurial self-efficacy. The study found that entrepreneurs in the agricultural sector of Pakistan lack the ability to create innovations based startups, and most of the entrepreneurial activity is either need-based or imitation with little or no differentiation. The lack of training programs in schools and universities is one of the causes of a low number of startups and risk-taking abilities. Agricultural marketing networks are weak and this reflects in the lower level of product differentiation, mass production, and adoption of new technologies and techniques in the agricultural sector of Pakistan.