An Evaluation of The Mechanisms of Developing Entrepreneurship in Agricultural Advisory Service Companies: in Isfahan Province, Iran

Agricultural engineering and technical consulting services (agricultural advisory services), have been initiated to provide, among other facilitating affairs, job opportunities for agricultural graduates; while without entrepreneurial activities and simply relying on public sector contracts many of them will not be able to be economically sustainable and preserve their members employment. So this study was conducted to evaluate the entrepreneurship development mechanisms prevalent among these firms. Using a two-stage sampling method, 102 people were selected from 500 companies’ members. Data was collected through a questionnaire the validity of which was confirmed by a panel of experts. The reliability of the main scale employed in the study was assessed through Cronbach’s Alpha equaled to 0.87. Findings revealed that the skills of: decision making, marketing, planning and predicting, as well as communication skills along with facilitating loan grants from banks were the most important variables from the viewpoint of companies’ members. Factor analysis categorized the examined variables in seven factors of: 1) managerial skills, 2) major entrepreneurial skills, 3) infrastructural, 4) business planning skills, 5) agricultural practical skills, 6) educational and finally 7) cultural factors. These factors were determinants of 73.65 percent of the variance among the solutions.