Investigation of Determinants and Drivers of Rural Entrepreneurship Development in Iran: A Meta-Analysis

Increasing rates of environmental crisis, poverty, unemployment and outmigration have made it necessary to concern rural entrepreneurship. Therefore, the objective of this study was investigating the determinants and drivers of developing rural entrepreneurship in Iran. In order to achieve this goal, meta-analysis was performed on 34 rural entrepreneurship studies that were publicized until February 2017. Also, the supporting drivers of developing rural entrepreneurship were identified through systematic review of 15 studies. Findings revealed that effect sizes of the factors that determine rural entrepreneurship are not the same. However, years of experience, parents’ job, attitude toward entrepreneurship and social communication have large effect sizes. Since the majority of effect sizes were not uniform across all studies, the moderate effects of gender and level of development on rural entrepreneurship were investigated. The results indicated that these heterogeneities are due to degree of effect size and they do not influence statistical significance of the effects. Furthermore, the systematic review clarified that the following drivers play important roles in developing rural entrepreneurship; entrepreneurial skills, entrepreneurial culture, modification or enactment of rules and laws and access to financial resources.