Business Incubators for Sustainable Development in the SPECA Region

As an innovation policy tool, business incubators (BIs) have great potential to catalyse innovative entrepreneurship by providing incentives, support, connections, and an enabling environment for people who want to develop and try out new ideas. Experimenting with ideas to create value and solve problems more systematically is essential for sustainable development and is therefore high on the policy agenda among the transition economies of the United Nations Special Programme for the Economies of Central Asia (SPECA), i.e. Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. This handbook reflects upon the lessons learned from incubator practices around the world and in transition economies, providing examples of initiatives in the Russian Federation and Kazakhstan, including the respective roles of universities, government, and the private sector. The recommendations and tools here target national and local governments, universities, as well as those parties involved in the development and management of business incubators and similar institutions, such as pre-incubators, accelerators, and entrepreneurship support centres in the SPECA countries.