Entrepreneurship and agriculture : investigating if entrepreneurship can be encouraged throughout the argicultural sector and assessing the provisions in place to ignite it

Neasy, Helen (2008) Entrepreneurship and agriculture : investigating if entrepreneurship can be encouraged throughout the argicultural sector and assessing the provisions in place to ignite it. Masters thesis, Dundalk Institute of Technology.

PDF (This work is made available on the understanding that the reader will not publish in any form either the whole or any part of it without permission from the author. This work may not be copied. The copyright of this work belongs to the author.) - Accepted Version Restricted to Registered users only Download (21MB)

Abstract

The agriculture sector has been subjected to several changes over the last four decades. Since the beginning of the 1960's, the numbers employed in agriculture have been rapidly declining along with total exports. Several new trends have emerged. The National Farm Survey (2007) highlighted that the income derived from farming is no longer adequate to maintain a comfortable standard of living. The ERSI (2008) painted a harsh reality of the livelihood of agriculture in Ireland, suggesting that it will continue on a downward trend without hope of recovery. In light of this, it has been widely suggested that the integration of entrepreneurship will greatly contribute to the re-vitalisation of the agriculture sector and thus, create a competitive advantage for Ireland. The key objective of this dissertation was primarily to assess whether or not members of the local farming community would consider starting an on-site business enterprise as a suitable way to increase the family income. A questionnaire was conducted in order to gain a satisfactory response to this question. In addition, a total of seven interviews were also executed. Three of which were conducted with support bodies including Enterprise-Ireland, Bord Bia and Teagasc, in a bid to assess the training, advisory and funding provisions in place for aspiring entrepreneurs.

Item Type:	Thesis (Masters)
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Agriculture; Farming income; Entrepreneurship; Business enterprise.
Subjects:	Business
Research Centres:	UNSPECIFIED
Depositing User:	Sean McGreal
Date Deposited:	29 Jul 2015 09:08
Last Modified:	29 Jul 2015 09:28
URI:	https://eprints.dkit.ie/id/eprint/424

Actions (login required)

View Item

Downloads