Access to Business Development Support Services and Performance of Youth-Owned Enterprises in Tanzania

We investigated a sample of 3,098 randomly chosen youth-owned enterprises (YOEs) in Tanzania and studied their access to business development support (BDS) services. YOEs are defined as enterprises owned and run by young entrepreneurs, aged between sixteen and thirty-five, according to the Tanzanian definition of youth. We analyzed which BDS services affect the performance of YOEs in terms of (i) number of employees, (ii) whether the enterprise keeps financial records and (iii) the entrepreneurs’ perception of the performance of their enterprises. With the support of the resource-based view, we found that access to expert advice is positively associated with a YOE’s number of employees and their ability to keep financial records. We also found that access to business management training and entrepreneurship training positively influences financial record keeping and enterprises’ perceived performance. Overall, we conclude that the resources that young entrepreneurs obtain through their access to BDS services are crucial for their enterprises.