Browsing by Author "Belete, Wondwossen"
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Item Human Capital Barriers to Technological Absorption and Innovation by Ethiopia’s Micro and Small Enterprises (MSEs)(2015-12-15) Belete, WondwossenEthiopia’s private sector is dominated by micro and small enterprises (MSEs), many of them operating informally. Accordingly, a key challenge for the country’s science, technology and innovation (STI) policymakers is finding ways to ensure that these small businesses absorb external technological innovations in order to enhance their performance and allow for follow-on innovations. This policy objective has an access to knowledge (A2K) dimension, because Ethiopia’s STI policies and strategies stress the need for improved MSE access to public domain patent information as a means to improving technological absorption. However, research by the Ethiopian Intellectual Property Office (EIPO) has found that despite the efforts of the Ethiopian government to foster small-enterprise absorption of public domain technological information contained in patent documents, MSE take-up of such technology tends to be poor (Belete, 2013). In this piece, the author, former EIPO Director of Intellectual Property Policy and Planning, argues that the government’s emphasis needs to be on building human capital in MSEs, in order to improve their capacity to absorb patent information. This argument draws on literature linking technological absorption capacity to human capital levels, along with findings from an Ethiopian government survey of 3,000 MSEs (MUDC, 2013). The author recommends improved MSE collaboration with intermediary organisations such as the country’s Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) institutions and industry development institutes.Item Patterns of Innovation and Knowledge in Two Ethiopian Informal-Sector Clusters: A Study of the Shiro Meda Handloom-Weavers and Merkato Shoemakers(LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2018-12-07) Belete, WondwossenThis article provides findings from a study of innovation and knowledge management practices in two informal-sector micro and small enterprise (MSE) clusters in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa: a handloom-weaving cluster and a shoemaking cluster. The activities in these two clusters were studied in order to explore the patterns of innovation in the MSEs, and to identify factors that influence collaboration and the spread of knowledge among the enterprises. The research also explored the enterprises’ knowledge appropriation behaviours and perspectives in relation to their informal-sector innovations, i.e., their orientations towards both informal knowledge appropriation mechanisms and formal tools of intellectual property (IP) protection.Item Policy Modalities for Support of Ethiopia’s Creative Industries(LINK Centre, University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, 2016-12-15) Belete, WondwossenCreative industries are a rapidly growing sector in the global economy in terms of income generation, job creation, and export earnings. The creative economy, based to a significant extent on ideas rather than physical capital, offers new, high-growth opportunities for developing countries. The author of this article led a WIPO-commissioned study (Belete & Tadesse, 2014) of the economic contribution of the creative industries in Ethiopia. That study quantified the contribution of “copyright industries” to the country’s economy, and showed the sector’s great potential to contribute to sustainable development in the country. Alongside the vast opportunities offered by the creative industries, that earlier study also found a number of corresponding challenges that needed to be addressed by Ethiopian policymakers. In this article, the author provides a framework for understanding the policy issues at play in the Ethiopian creative industries sector and then brings that framework to bear on the findings of his earlier study (Belete & Tadesse, 2014). The result is a set of proposed policy measures that the author determines are necessary for optimal support of Ethiopia’s creative economy.