The country’s GEI score of 26.8% marks the fifth biggest gain globally compared with last year’s 22.1%

 Reported by HPMM Group according to FINANCIAL TRIBUNE ; The 2018 edition of Global Entrepreneurship Index, a composite indicator of the health of entrepreneurship ecosystem, has ranked Iran 72nd out of a total list of 137 countries and 11th out of 14 in the Middle East and North Africa region.

Iran’s standing has improved 13 notches globally and three spots regionally compared with 2017.

The country’s GEI score of 26.8% marks the fifth biggest gain globally compared with last year’s 22.1%, Thegedi.org reported.

GEI, compiled by US-based The Global Entrepreneurship and Development Institute, measures both the quality of entrepreneurship and the extent of support for entrepreneurs. It identifies 14 components important for the health of entrepreneurial ecosystems and data needed to capture each, and uses this data to calculate three levels of scores for a given country: the overall GEI score, scores for individuals and institutions, and pillar level scores (which measure the quality of each of the 14 components).

These components include opportunity perception, startup skills, risk acceptance, networking, cultural support, opportunity for startups, technology absorption, human capital, competition, product innovation, process innovation, high growth, internationalization and risk capital.

Iran’s strongest suit, according to the report, is its “startup skills” with a score of 99%.

Launching a successful venture requires the potential entrepreneur to have the startup skills. Skill perception measures the percentage of the population who believe they have adequate startup skills. Most people in developing countries think they have the skills needed to start a business, but their skills were usually acquired through workplace trial and error in relatively simple business activities.

In developed countries, business formation, operation, management, etc., require skills that are acquired through formal education and training. Hence, education, especially post-secondary education, plays a vital role in teaching and developing entrepreneurial skills.

The weakest area of Iran’s GEI is “risk acceptance” (1%). Of the personal entrepreneurial traits, fear of failure is one of the most important obstacles to a startup. Aversion to high-risk enterprises can snuff out a nascent entrepreneurial spark. Risk perception is defined as the percentage of the population who do not believe that fear of failure would prevent them from starting a business. Country risk refers to the transfer and convertibility risk of a country, which closely correlate to business.

Iran’s individual score, entrepreneurial qualities of the people in the ecosystem, is 58% and its institutional score, pertaining to the quality of the institutions that support entrepreneurship, is 42%.

The top 10 countries for 2018 show a pattern similar to last year’s high-income, mostly European, nations. The top countries are the United States, Switzerland, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, Denmark, Iceland, Ireland, Sweden and France in a descending order.

The major surprise this year is the movement of the UK from eighth place to fourth place and the movement of Sweden from fourth to ninth place.

Because the scores in the highest range are so close, small changes in score from one year to the next can produce a relatively large shift in ranks among the top 10.