Abstract
Food security is one of the most fundamental challenges facing many countries, especially in the developing economies, which still has a vast section of its population still trapped in the socio-economic cocoon of poverty, unemployment, and inequality. This paper aims to investigate the institutional support in the facilitation of empowerment and development of youth Small, Medium, and Micro-Enterprises (SMMEs) to be active participants in the agribusiness economic mainstream. The paradigm shift from primary agriculture into urban farming business models in agri-business could accelerate the ascendancy of youth SMMEs in the competitiveness stakes. The theoretical analysis focused on the resource-based view model, institutional theory, and the role of the CSR impact as a conceptual framework for the study. The research design was predicated on the quantitative methodology, which enabled the researchers to statistically test the reliability and validity of the theory. The findings indicated that the CSR interventions had not yielded a fundamental impact on assisting youth SMMEs within the agribusiness sector. The results also identified a lack of tangible and result-driven institutional support from policy-makers and authorities. Overall targeted technological transfer as a strategic and critical resource to youth SMMEs is another constraining factor from empirical findings. The results also revealed the lack of monetary and non-monetary access by youth SMMEs as hampering their competitiveness and profits ability. The findings advocated that the policy-makers could synthesize the theories encapsulated in the study and the empirical evidence as the bedrock for bespoke, customized, and tailor-made youth SMMEs’ bespoke support, empowerment, and development of their entities.
Highlights
Continentally and in the Sub-Saharan region, food and nutrition could be described as the significant priority on the policymakers and authorities’ agendas to mitigate the dire and bleak consequences if left unattended
Almost half of the participants use public transport, and the results show that 41% of youth SMMEs involved in the study do not have private transport
The study points to the need for the policy-makers, institutions, authorities, captains of industry, civic organizations, and practitioners within the agri-business industry to create a conducive environment for the SMMEs to prosper and contribute positively to the country’s economic fortunes
Summary
Continentally and in the Sub-Saharan region, food and nutrition could be described as the significant priority on the policymakers and authorities’ agendas to mitigate the dire and bleak consequences if left unattended. Many cities in emerging economies in the Sub-Saharan region, including South Africa, should identify various innovative ways of addressing the food security challenges within the broader agricultural sector. It is incumbent upon policy-makers, authorities, practitioners, academics, and entrepreneurs to prioritize the significance of devising and strategizing optimal action plans as a matter of urgency. While the global trends are shaping towards the gains brought about by the dawn of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR), such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), Fifth Generation (5G), blockchains and algorithms, and the concomitant solutions towards the food value chains there is still a huge room for growth for the emerging economies if they could bolster policy and institutional certainty
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