Global Entrepreneurship Week 2009 is almost here so I wanted to take a minute to highlight some of the more common sources on international data about entrepreneurship. 

Scott Shane had a nice posting on the NY Times blog last week using the World Bank Group Entrepreneurship Survey.  Currently the last data from that project was collected at the beginning of 2008.  The World Bank will be collecting two more years of data beginning in 2010.  The data currently cover approximately one hundred countries.  The data is not fully comparable across countries but it attempts to encourage comparability by looking at only one type of business registration, limited liability corporations, which the authors contend is the most consistent legal form across countries.  Also see upcoming event at the World Bank.

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development will be releasing data next week on 23 economies.  Drawing official data from national statistical offices, the OECD tabulations are of most interest for the study of developed economies but get into many aspects of growth firms like gazelle firms and high-growth firms in the economy.

Last week, the Legatum Institute put out a new version of their Prosperity Index (which has an entrepreneurship component).  According to their most recent index, “Entrepreneurs at the micro level need good economic policies at the macro level. Innovation and entrepreneurship are more strongly related to economic fundamentals than any other factor in a society. Aspiring entrepreneurs will often hit a 'ceiling' limiting their success if a nation’s economy is not fundamentally strong.”  There isn't anything there I would disagree with.  I am having some trouble finding the data details in their current report but as I remember, for many of their items, they rely on data from the Gallup World Poll, but interestingly entrepreneurship is not one of those items.  The Gallup World Poll does have some data available on entrepreneurship, although it is not as readily available as other sources.  A case study in what Gallup collects on many countries is included in this write-up on South Africa.

And lastly, the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) continues to collect data on nascent entrepreneurship and some other aspects of entrepreneurship.  In our experience, countries must be aware of country-level quality issues related to the vendors which were used in collection but these data remain useful in some areas of cross-country study.