A region with the world’s highest youth entrepreneurial ambition — yet among the lowest rates of actual business creation.

The MENA region is home to one of the world’s youngest and most ambitious populations. This demographic powerhouse is bursting with creativity, resilience, and entrepreneurial drive. Yet much of this potential remains untapped. According to the World Bank, one in every three young people in the region is unemployed — the highest rate globally. Local job markets cannot absorb the growing wave of graduates, the public sector is saturated, and private businesses often lack the scale and dynamism needed to generate meaningful opportunities for emerging talent.

In this context, entrepreneurship is not a luxury or fallback plan — it is a vital pathway forward. Nowhere is the need for a vibrant, youth-driven entrepreneurial culture more urgent, or more promising, than in MENA.

A region of dreamers without a launchpad

According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) — a leading study tracking entrepreneurship across more than 100 countries — young people in parts of the MENA region consistently express some of the world’s highest levels of entrepreneurial intent. The desire to innovate, build businesses, and shape their own futures is strong and widespread.

But here lies the paradox: while ambition is high, the actual rate of new business creation lags behind regions like Sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia, and Latin America. GEM’s Total Early-Stage Entrepreneurial Activity (TEA) index — which measures the percentage of adults actively starting or managing a new business — shows that many MENA countries trail significantly.

This gap between intent and execution reflects deeper structural challenges. Support systems across the region are not equipped to help young people turn entrepreneurial ideas into reality. As formal job markets shrink, many youths remain unemployed or turn to informal, survival-driven ventures with little chance to grow. These micro-enterprises often operate on razor-thin margins, without access to finance, mentorship, or legal recognition — trapping young entrepreneurs in subsistence mode rather than enabling them to thrive.

Entrepreneurship is not a luxury or fallback plan — it is a vital pathway forward.

Frustrated by these barriers, growing numbers of young people in countries such as Lebanon, Tunisia, and Egypt are looking abroad to fulfill their aspirations. This emigration is draining local economies of bright minds and bold ideas, transforming what could have been a demographic dividend into a missed opportunity. Energy that could have fueled local innovation and renewal instead powers other economies.

Building future-ready citizens

The combination of high youth ambition and entrenched barriers calls for bold action — not just to prepare the next generation for the future of work, but to prepare them to lead resilient, adaptive societies.

The 21st century is shaped by artificial intelligence, climate change, digital disruption, and geopolitical instability. Resilience, creativity, and leadership are no longer optional; they are essential. At its core, entrepreneurship is not just about launching businesses. It is a mindset — the ability to see opportunity where others see barriers, to act rather than wait, to learn through failure, and to build solutions from the ground up. Entrepreneurial thinking also fosters collaboration, empathy, and experimentation: skills most needed for the new economy.

Entrepreneurship must be treated as a core development pillar, not a niche initiative.

This mindset must move beyond startups and tech hubs into classrooms, communities, and everyday life. Young people must be equipped not only to weather uncertainty but to lead purposefully across sectors. Entrepreneurial thinking, like literacy or numeracy, can be taught — and must be introduced early. Waiting until university, or until a young person is unemployed, is far too late.

Changemaker Club members

Entrepreneurial education should begin in primary school, embedded in national curricula and reinforced through project-based learning, mentorship, and exposure to real-world challenges. It must not remain a privilege for elite schools or innovation hubs, but a right for all youth, accessible in every neighborhood across the region.

Imagining the schools of tomorrow

Despite significant gains in school enrollment, the MENA region faces a deep learning crisis. The World Bank reports that more than 50% of children in the region live in “learning poverty” — unable to read and understand a simple text by age 10. On global benchmarks like the PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) tests, which evaluate 15-year-olds in reading, mathematics, and science, many MENA countries score among the lowest worldwide, particularly in skills tied to problem-solving, critical thinking, and creativity.

This crisis is not primarily a result of underfunding. Countries like Egypt, Tunisia, and Jordan allocate a substantial share of GDP or public spending to education. The deeper issue lies in outdated curricula and rote learning methods that fail to prepare students for a rapidly evolving, knowledge-driven world.

To truly prepare youth, classrooms must become environments that reflect real life — spaces that inspire curiosity, reward creativity, and cultivate resilience. Here’s how:

1. Create Safe Spaces for Growth and Failure — Innovation requires experimentation, and with it, failure. Schools must normalize iteration, peer feedback, and project-based learning so that testing ideas becomes as routine as preparing for exams.
2. Integrate Entrepreneurial Thinking Across the Curriculum — Entrepreneurship should be a core competency embedded across disciplines. Whether in science, math, or the arts, students should identify problems, explore solutions, and view themselves as creators and changemakers.
3. Empower Teachers as Innovation Guides — Teachers must be equipped not just to deliver content, but to coach exploration. Professional development should emphasize design thinking, facilitation of real-world projects, and student-centered learning.

Fostering a culture of innovation requires collective action

The challenges ahead — climate change, unemployment, inequality, and digital disruption — are too large for any single actor to tackle. Building a generation of entrepreneurial leaders in MENA demands a whole-of-society effort. Schools, civil society, the private sector, and governments must work together to cultivate a culture of innovation, problem-solving, and social impact.

Entrepreneurial thinking, like literacy or numeracy, can be taught — and must be introduced early.

Entrepreneurship must be treated as a core development pillar, not a niche initiative. Civil society can provide grassroots mentorship, the private sector can invest in youth ventures and internships, and governments can embed innovation in curricula, policies, and funding.

When these forces align, the impact goes beyond job creation. It catalyzes cultural transformation — where problem-solving is second nature, failure is embraced as growth, and youth are empowered not just to adapt to the future, but to shape it.

MENA youth already have the ideas, the drive, and the heart. With the right systems and support, they can be a force for inclusive growth and renewal across the region.