ANNOUNCE: Entrepreneurship Indicators

[entrepreneurship-phd at lists.uni-essen.de]

Entrepreneurship Indicators at the OECD

The Statistics Directorate of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation
and Development (OECD) has recently launched a Project to develop
internationally-comparable key indicators on entrepreneurship.

For many years, economists and policy makers have identified
entrepreneurship as an important driver for employment, innovation and
economic growth. In order to establish the conditions that foster
entrepreneurship, policy makers realise that quality comparable
information is crucial. By developing reliable,
internationally-comparable data, countries can benefit from the
experience of others and monitor the success of their initiatives.

The OECD is known for facilitating high quality, comparable statistics
in a variety of domains and is now applying this statistical experience
to the field of entrepreneurship. The core of this initiative involves
the scoping of future entrepreneurship data collection activities,
possibly culminating in an international survey program, based on the
results of the initial phase of this project. This phase involves
determining policy priorities and associated data requirements, which is
being accomplished through extensive consultations and through
deliberations of an expert working group. In addition, we are
identifying and assessing existing international statistical information
on entrepreneurship in order to avoid duplication of data collection.
Finally, to encourage convergence of existing data, the OECD is working
to develop common concepts and definitions.

This project is conducted in close collaboration with policy analysts,
Committees and Working Parties throughout the OECD, as well as with a
broad spectrum of national and international bodies, including Eurostat,
the ILO, UNCTAD, various national entrepreneurship research programs,
and the International Consortium for Dynamic Entrepreneurship
Benchmarking. Financial support is being provided by the Kauffman
Foundation of the United States, which has long supported practical
research aimed at facilitating successful entrepreneurship. Tim Davis, a
former senior official with Statistics Canada, is managing the Project.
Other Team members are Michela Gamba and Erica Matthews.

In light of your expertise and interest in this field, we would welcome
your input to the development of this entrepreneurship indicators
programme. Please direct any queries or comments regarding this
initiative to us at the address below. We are particularly interested in
any views you may have on entrepreneurship policy priorities and related
data gaps or needs. If you would like to be kept informed of the work on
this Entrepreneurship Indicator project, please let us know and we will
keep you updated.

We would also appreciate it if you could pass this announcement on to
other colleagues interested in the development of entrepreneurship
indicators.

Erica Matthews
Entrepreneurship Indicators Project
OECD Statistics Directorate
erica.matthews at oecd.org