Entrepreneurs Key in Middle East

Could the kind of creative thinking and business risk-taking that produced Californias Silicon Valley transform the Nile and Jordan River valleys in North Africa and the Middle East? Very possibly. Educating entrepreneurs is crucial to economic growth, especially in the Middle East where entrepreneurship has not exactly been encouraged, Iliya Harik, a political science professor at Indiana University, told a recent Washington conference co-sponsored by the Middle East Institute and the World Bank. Banking rules, including those affecting the availability of credit for private-sector and state-owned companies, must be overhauled as well, said Masood Ahmed, vice president of the World Banks poverty reduction and economic management network.