Initial research has found the following:

Ireland:

• The population of the South East of Ireland is 423,000, 44% of which are less than 29 years old (30% of the population are less than the 19 years).

• 50% of those that attend third level education do so in an institute outside the region; and more than
• 60% of graduates from the three third level institutes in the region find employment outside the region (Dee, 2004).

• Unemployment levels in the South East are higher than the national average of 4.2% (Waterford = 7.05%, Wexford = 5.8%, Carlow = 4.8%, South Tipperary = 4.3%, and Kilkenny = 3.1% (source CSO December 2004).

• The level of disposable income is only 88% of the national average (Dee, 2004).

• Between 7.5% and 14% of all businesses in Ireland are run by Women (Henry and Kennedy, 2002).

• For every 100 male entrepreneurs in Ireland, there are only 29 women entrepreneurs (Fitzsimons, O’Gorman, Hart and McGloin, 2004).

Wales:

• South-West Wales comprises of the unitary authorities of Ceredigion, Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire.

• The structure of the economy in South-West Wales is heavily influenced by the rural nature of the economy and farm-related activities remain significant.

• The vast bulk of employment is accounted for by the small enterprise sector and the region has very few large employers. The density of population is low and the balance of population is more heavily skewed towards the elderly.

• GDP in Wales was £12,629 per head of the population in January 2005, compared to £15,980 for the UK as a whole. Wales has the lowest GDP for the whole of the UK at 79% of the average. Average gross earnings are even lower in South-West Wales with GDP at 65% of the EU average.

• The total percentage of self-employed in Wales is 12% and the total of women is 3%. This is lower than the UK average and shows that there is a need to encourage entrepreneurial activity amongst women in Wales.

• One of the Welsh Assembly Government’s key strategic themes is to encourage more enterprise among disadvantaged groups and communities and to increase their rate of business start-ups and growth. Two groups of people that have been targeted for this strategy are women and minority groups.

Other research findings:

• Brush (1992) highlights that women business owners are similar to male business owners across some demographic factors, problems and business characteristics. However women differ widely across individual dimensions related to skills, education, work experience, approach to venture creation or acquisition, business goals, problems and performance.
• Differences in male and female entrepreneurs in the UK can be seen as women tend to concentrate on retailing and service industries and have less prior work experience, training and business experience (Carter et al, 2001)
• Research indicates that there is a clear need to widen access to training. Many of the policies that have encouraged the development of training for entrepreneurs have been ‘gender blind’ and as such they “serve to strengthen – albeit largely inadvertently – the prevailing gender-based inequalities” (OECD, 2004).
• Carter (2000b) argues that such programmes must address the female experiences within start-up training programmes e.g. weaker financial position, reluctance to take on large amounts of debt and the impact of under capitalisation on the future performance of their firms.