在20世纪90年代，种族大屠杀给卢旺达造成了深重的伤害。如今，那里的商家生意兴隆，旅游业欣欣向荣。在20世纪70年代和80年代，哥伦比亚麦德林市（Medellin）饱受非法毒品交易及其引发的暴力活动之害。如今，麦德林市的治安状况相对好转，已建立起一个合法的商业环境。（请点击阅读英文报道）

有关专家指出，这些经济成果都归功于“创业生态系统”。在这种环境中，有志于创业的人能够便利地获得指导、培训和融资。

良好的经营环境不会自动形成

为了建立一个创业生态系统，包括公司企业、政府、大学、投资方、银行、非政府组织和基金会在内的各利益相关方互相联系，往往由一位疏通协调人来帮助他们达成一个共同的目标。在哥伦比亚的另一个城市马尼萨莱斯（Manizales），一个私营基金会承担起疏通协调的职能。而在威斯康星州的密尔沃基（Milwaukee），这个职能则由一个市民组织承担。

马萨诸塞州韦尔斯利（Wellesley, Massachusetts）的巴布森学院（Babson College）有一个创业生态系统项目（Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Project），项目负责人丹尼尔·伊森伯格（Daniel Isenberg）说，因地制宜很有利，因为当地的利益相关方都了解当地的优势，而且知道如何发挥这些优势。他还说，推行全国性方案或试图移植外国模式的做法都不太成功。

伊森伯格指出，重要的是繁育一个具体城市或省区的“植物和动物”。

各个利益相关方共同确保颁行有利于商业经营的规章，提高教育程度，建立投资方网络以及展开其他各项努力。

创业生态系统能够加速商业发展。据伊森伯格介绍，密尔沃基市自2013年启动“发展密尔沃基”（英文链接Scale Up Milwaukee）行动以来，便出现了这种景象。而在马尼萨莱斯，在经历了更长的一个发展期后，支持商业发展的力度得到增强。世界银行（World Bank）将该市列为哥伦比亚最适宜商业经营的地区，而且该市的“发展马尼萨莱斯”（Manizales-Mas）行动旨在进一步加速商业增长。

美国国务院的全球创业项目（Global Entrepreneurship Program）以及相关的创业发展网络（英文链接Enterprise Development Network）致力于在全世界形成有利于小企业发展的生态系统。

Small businesses are like plants: They thrive in a robust ecosystem

During the 1990s, Rwanda was deeply damaged by genocide. Today, family businesses thrive and tourism grows there. In the 1970s and 1980s, Medellin, Colombia, was blighted by the illegal drug trade and related violence. Now, Medellin enjoys relative safety and a legitimate business environment.

These economic achievements, experts say, are due to “entrepreneurship ecosystems,” in which potential business owners have relatively easy access to mentoring, training and financing.

A good business climate doesn’t just spring up

To create an ecosystem, stakeholders — for example, businesses, government, universities, investors, banks, nongovernmental groups and foundations — talk with each other, often with a facilitator to help them agree on a common objective. In Manizales, also in Colombia, a private foundation took the facilitator role, and in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, a civic group.

Geographical concentration helps because local stakeholders understand the community’s strengths and know how to build upon them, says Daniel Isenberg, head of the Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Project at Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts. He says countrywide initiatives or those that try to transplant a foreign model are less successful.

“It’s about empowering the ‘flora and fauna’” of a particular city or province, Isenberg says.

The stakeholders work together to secure business-friendly regulations, educational improvements, investors’ networks or other initiatives.

Entrepreneurship ecosystems spur faster business growth. It’s been happening in Milwaukee since Scale Up Milwaukee launched in 2013, according to Isenberg. In Manizales, over a longer period, the city has become more supportive of business growth. The World Bank ranked it as the best place to do business in Colombia, and the city’s Manizales-Mas campaign aims to further accelerate business growth.

Creating small-business-friendly ecosystems around the world is a goal of the U.S. Department of State’s Global Entrepreneurship Program and related Enterprise Development Network.