With a score of 3.41 out of 10, Cúcuta (metropolitan area) was located almost at the bottom of the Subnational Entrepreneurship Index (ISE) 2024, by occupying box 17 of the table among 23 cities, which means that the city does not offer conditions that make the creation and growth of businesses possible.
The Private Competitiveness Council (CPC), the Bolívar Davivienda Foundation, iNNpulsa Colombia and the Universidad del Rosario, responsible for the study, indicated that this first measurement of the ISE is intended to offer an accurate diagnosis of the entrepreneurial ecosystem, with the incorporation of 61 indicators distributed in eight pillars. In addition, 13 entrepreneurs’ perception variables are included.
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Cúcuta (along with Los Patios, Villa del Rosario and El Zulia) was the best qualified in the entire country in social capital (6.01 points), pillar that refers to the perception of entrepreneurship, risk, success and failure.
In this sense, the authors explained that, however, the appreciation that entrepreneurs have about entrepreneurship and how the environment favors it is not very optimistic in Colombia.
In this pillar, the city achieved the highest score in the indicator access to other experienced entrepreneurs (10) and reached third position in effective contacts with ecosystem actors (6.64).
In other pillars, it obtained very average scores in: infrastructure (4.4 points -rank 18-), entrepreneurial performance (3.7 -rank 5-), business environment (3.6 -rank 20-) and financing (3.2 -rank 8-).
But where Cúcuta fared worst are: technological adaptation and intra-company innovation (2.9 –position 13-), human capital, skills and competencies (2.5 –position 23-) and innovative ecosystem and knowledge generation (1.0 –position 21-).
The ISE highlights that, in cities like Cúcuta, regulatory challenges remain (licenses and permits, taxes, trade restrictions, among others) and the business structure, which influence the generation and sustainability of an environment conducive to the creation, survival and growth of businesses.
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Entrepreneurship, vital in the economy
The president of the CPC, Ana Fernanda Maiguashca, mentioned that entrepreneurship is a vital part of economies, it promotes growth, innovation, job creation and social progress.
“Therefore, the study of the motivations for entrepreneurship, as well as the determining factors of the growth and success of entrepreneurship, is a priority for the design and implementation of effective public policies”.
According to Fernando Cortés, president of the Bolívar-Davivienda Foundation, although this measurement establishes a general ranking, none of the cities presents a marked superiority in their performance.
“Bogotá, the city that occupies the first position, only registers an overall score of 6.4 on a scale between 0 and 10, which underlines the existence of wide margins for improvement of cities in terms of entrepreneurship.”
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The rector of Unirosario, Alejandro Cheyne, highlighted that this type of measurements They are also useful to make the challenges visible. and needs that the country has in terms of statistics at the subnational level.
“In this particular case, to evaluate the performance of segments of the economy about which we do not have much information, as is the informal business fabric”he added.
On the other hand, Hernán Ceballos, general manager of iNNpulsa Colombia, assured that with this first measurement of the ISE They hope to continue contributing to the construction of public initiatives and private companies that consolidate favorable environments for entrepreneurship in the territories.
“These results constitute a fundamental input to continue guiding the initiatives of iNNpulsa and the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism to populations that demand the strengthening of capacities entrepreneurial and productive.”
Ceballo highlighted thatThe first steps are being taken with the strategy of the ZASCA Reindustrialization Centers and the FortaleSER program, as well as inter-institutional coordination with special emphasis on the Pacific, Amazon and Caribbean regions.
The data
The first three positions in the ISE were occupied by Bogotá DC (6.42), Medellín AM (5.54) and Manizales AM (4.88). They were followed by Bucaramanga AM (4.71) and Cali AM (4.69). At the bottom are Sincelejo (23), Valledupar (22) and Riohacha (21), with scores of 2.37, 2.67 and 2.80.
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