Building Adult Educational Programs in Entrepreneurship Based on Mezirow: The Case of Agricultural Entrepreneurship

Abstract:     
This chapter reports on a study of the benefits of the Integrated Education in Agricultural Entrepreneurship (IEAE) based on Mezirow’s “critical reflection”. The research intention is to categorize the constructs of the following fundamental concepts: a. “farmer’s entrepreneurship skill”, b. “approach of integrated entrepreneurship education” and c. “life-learning process in agricultural entrepreneurship education”. IEAE substantially covers the transfer of knowledge, skills, and attitudes that will allow in each farmer/learner to plan, to launch, and to manage his/her own business and it should be approached from leadership perspective and as a life-long learning process. Entrepreneurship constitutes an important factor that determines the level of economic growth, competitiveness, employment, and social prosperity of a small country such as Greece (Spanoudaki,2008). For purposes of this chapter agricultural entrepreneurship is defined as an effort developed individually or collectively for the exploitation of resources that the individual or the team allocates for the production of useful agricultural products, services, or goods connected with the production of agricultural products and their distribution in the market, satisfying market needs. According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (Bosma & Levie, 2010), entrepreneurship is conceptualized as each effort for building a new business or a new activity, such as the free profession, where the creation of a new business, or the extension of an existing one, is done by an individual or by teams of individuals, from public institutions or from established private businesses. Through the application of Mezirow’s “critical reflection” in agricultural entrepreneurship education, education leaders, policy-makers, researchers, and extensionists can create a learning environment to motivate agricultural entrepreneurs to evaluate their experiences and provide them the opportunity to review their beliefs, opinions, and values.

Keywords: Entrepreneurship Education, Mezirow, Agricultural Entrepreneurship

JEL Classification: M13

Accepted Paper Series